My Oh My
by Falaphesian
Summary: It's about reckless driving, faerie infestations, and the finer points of friendship. It's about speeding up the hill just to feel the fall on the other side. And yes, it's about Kairi and Yuffie, Larxene and Naminé, and everything in between.
1. A Hit and Run Kinda Thing

**This fic contains elements of shoujo and shounen-ai. This means girl on girl and boy on boy. Joy oh joy. If this squicks you in any way, shape, or form, please don't bother going any further.**

Pairings? Right off the bat you'll see **RikuxSora**. They're not really a focus at all though. The focus is around **YuffiexKairi** and **LarxenexNaminé**. There's also some **LeonxCloud**, but that won't be in here for a several more chapters as well.

Though I don't think this needs saying, seeing as it is a piece of **fan**fiction... Kingdom Hearts and character not mine. Sadly. Tragically. Etc.

Almost done. Hang in there with me if you're reading this.

You can expect something similar to Raspberry Heaven, but very, very different. As in, I think that My Oh My is much more original. It has some **very weird** things that are going to start happening and, for the most part, My Oh My is much more of my mind going haywire. It happens a lot, so **expect the worst**. It's got a weird style of writing, a weird way of focusing on one pairing per chapter, and a perverted Larxene. You've been told, warned, and alerted, so without further ado...

(x) (x) (x)

**My Oh My**

'A Hit and Run Kinda Thing'

If I may take only a moment of your time, I would like to introduce you to our fine cast of characters. They're not special, they're not renowned for anything in particular. No Emmy, no Oscar adds to any of their names. But they all share one thing in common. They all made one mistake at one point in time.

For Yuffie, it was speeding. She was doing seventy-five in a school district. No, she wasn't drunk. No, she wasn't attempting to hit an ex-husband (for indeed, the idea of marriage made Yuffie rather sick to her stomach). She was simply trying to speed up in order to feel that rush that one gets when speeding down a hill. The feeling that--

"It's like your stomach is in your throat or something... No... It's more than that! It's like... for half a second, you're not on the ground and you're not in control. And you're not safe and you're not secure, but _damn_ does it feel good!"

For Kairi, it was running a red light. No, she wasn't in a hurry to get home to her dying grandmother. No, she wasn't trying to get to a fifty-percent-off shoe sale at Payless. Kairi was singing along to the music set so loud that it would have made any normal person deaf. ...Even though Kairi was quite normal by normal standards, one could say that she occasionally displayed non-normal--

"Sometimes I feel like everyone sort of expects me to be this perfect girl from some greeting card family. I mean... okay, I don't usually take as many risks as most people. And I am sort of small and girly looking, but seeing as I am a girl, I don't really see a problem with that. So what's so wrong with trying to prove that fact to everyone else every once in a while, huh?"

For Larxene, it was reckless driving. Not just reckless driving, I suppose, for many things fall under the category of reckless driving. But let me tell you right now that no, she was not drunk. And before you ask, no, she was not high either. Larxene was simply being Larxene. And perhaps if the police officer had known who she was, he would have taken this into consideration before he reported her for--

"Get off the road you shit head! What, is your mother watching you drive or something? Honestly, at least go at the fucking speed limit! Oh, what, you have a problem with me honking at you? Fucking ass wipe! Go polish the hooves on a donkey, you--!" And the rest of Larxene's words have been cut for your safety.

And finally, we come to the fourth corner of the square.

For Naminé, it was a single stop sign. There had been other stop signs in the past, of course, but this was the stop sign sheltered behind an overgrown weeping willow that was just weeping a bit too much that day. No, Naminé herself was not crying, suffering after the traumatic breakup with boyfriend of the past five years. No, she was not frantically trying to regain control of her car after having the breaks tampered with by some unknown break-tampering maniac. ...She just--

"I didn't see it, I swear! I'm sorry, honest, but I couldn't see around the tree and I guess I wasn't really looking at the markings on the road or anything... It's just one stop sign! Can't you let it go? ...Please?"

Thankfully, the police officers did not let these cases go. They were reported to the DMV and (that one final mistake being the fifth and final on their list of absolutely horrid driver errors) all four of the girls were told to report to a driving improvement clinic on the thirteenth of October.

And all four of them went.

And all four of them met.

And all four of them were changed forever.

Still normal, yes, but changed forever. So here is their story, bizarre, abnormal, and unbelievable as it may seem. Take it for what you will, think what you like, and make sure that the next time you are seated behind the wheel, you run that stoplight. It just might lead you along a road a little less traveled, but a lot better suited for where you want to go.

x x x

"I'm tired."

"Kairi..."

"Leave me alone."

"Kai-riiii..."

"I hate you."

"Kairi." Sora pouted at the two inch thick slab of wood --they'd started calling it a 'door' lately... new-fangled inventions...-- currently separating him from his best friend. It was cold because there was no heat. It was dark because there was no electricity. And it smelled like Chinese food because there was no air-freshener.

And just why was the condo lacking in all these things?

Well, somehow Riku, Sora, and Kairi, even with all of their magical money powers combined, still couldn't manage to keep their two bedroom, one bathroom, lousy-excuse-for-a-condo properly equipped with heating and electricity... Not to mention that this particular condo just happened to be located right above Lucky's Chinese Take-Out.

...It wasn't that they were poor. It was just that Riku didn't have a very timely manner about paying bills. He was always busy doing other things like... going to work, brushing his hair, screwing around with Sora, washing his hair, making out with Sora, eating, admiring his hair, or sometimes even having sex with Sora.

In fact, part of the whole reason Kairi was locked up in her room was because of the whole sex with Sora part. For those of you who don't know, it is rather difficult to sleep when you're lying on your back, staring at the ceiling, listening to your two best friends ramming the headboard of their own bed rather violently against the wall at two in the morning while screaming profanities and moaning each other's names as loudly as humanly possible.

"Kairi, you're gonna be late," Sora chided, crossing his skinny arms one over the other and leaning against the wall beside her door. He'd spent his entire life growing up with the girl, so of course he'd know how to deal with her. ...Sometimes she just got a little difficult. ...Like when she didn't get enough sleep.

Deciding that he had to intervene now or never, Sora tried the doorknob again and was surprised to find it unlocked. With a triumphant grin, Sora swiftly nudged it open, prepared to bellow his patented good morning tune (which, if you're interested, involves vast amounts of spinning around and fluttering your hands while hollering "Daisies, daisies, up in the morning new! And now it's time to rise and shine as I wish a good day to yoooou!") just before he was socked in the face by a stuffed animal that was either a very hairless girl or a very ugly bear.

"_God_ Sora! **GET OUT**! I'm getting **DRESSED**! You freaking _pervert_!"

"...I'm gay. Anything I see only makes me shudder with disgust," Sora stated innocently, plucking the stuffed thing up from the floor and attempting to examine it closer. What the hell was it anyway??

"Gee, thanks Sora. You're a wonderful friend. That makes me feel so good about myself that I could just pee." Glaring icily at the adorable little spiky haired boy standing in her doorway, Kairi grumbled, tugging a tank top hastily over her head as she continued to whine. Kairi always _was_ a very gifted multi-tasker.

"Listen, Sora, I know that two-thirds of the condo belongs to you and Riku and I know you guys really care about each other. I don't have a problem with the sex, really. But I do sorta have a problem with the noise. I mean, it's great that you're having fun and all, but do you have to have fun so _loudly_? And do you have to have fun three times a night? It's just that--"

But just as Kairi was gifted with multi-tasking, now applying foundation and blush as she prattled on, Sora was good at changing topics. It was wonderful the way that worked.

"Kairi, what is this?" he asked, holding the ratty old... thing between his thumb and index finger.

"...That's Hairless Hannah. Why?"

"...No real reason." Making a face, Sora tossed poor Hairless Hannah back across the room onto Kairi's bed. The room was small, probably no bigger than a walk in closet, and Sora always felt guilty about him and Riku having a much larger room every time he saw Kairi running back and forth across her own dinky room... looking for her left sock and running into her desk, chair, end table... Much like she was doing at that very moment, really.

"Shit, what time is it, Sora?"

"Quarter past nine. I tried to wake you up an hour ago, but--"

"I was _sleeping_! Because I didn't **get** any because you just _had_ to **get** some last night, didn't you?!"

"...Um, okay, well, first of all, I didn't understand that sentence at all. Could you try it again with a little more 'got' and a little less 'get'? Because it's not a matter of me 'getting' some, seeing as I already 'got' some. Oh, did you want to get some? Because I thought we all had this conversation a long time ago..." Sora's eyes widened as he dove for the floor, trying to avoid another mad-bomber attack from Hairless Hannah.

"NO, I DON'T need to **GET** some!"

"...Are you sure? ...Because there's lots of places you could go to--"

"_Out_!"

With a swift shove from Kairi's sock-less foot, Sora found himself staring bug-eyed at that wonderful 'door' thing that just slammed shut merely half an inch away from the tip of his nose.

"...Kairi?"

"What." The floorboards squeaked in dismay as Kairi ran over them, hunting for her lost sock. Where was the damned thing anyway?! "Sora, if I'm late for this stupid session clinic thing, I'm in deep shit. It's not just high school where you can skip class or something... They're like... holding my license _hostage_!"

"Yeah, but Kai..."

"And when I don't have my license, I need _you_ to drive me everywhere and I really feel _awful_ about that because _I'm_ using your gas money. Ack! That reminds me! You drove me to the mall last weekend so I need to pay you for two miles' worth of--"

"...Kairi?" Sora squeaked. He wasn't sure if he could be heard through the door or not, but he really doubted the door made much of a difference at this point.

"--and before that you drove me to that really nice hair salon out of town. And even though it was for my birthday, you and Riku already paid for that great weekend getaway to that spa on the other side of the island for me..."

_Mm, that weekend **was **nice. Riku came up with that idea that we should tie--_

Jolted out of his happy little trip down memory lane, Sora blinked rapidly, now finding himself face to face with Kairi's knees from his cozy little spot on the hardwood floor. Giving Sora a puzzled look, Kairi simply raised an eyebrow before looking at her doorknob, where Sora's eyes were now resting on a lone sock.

"Not a word, Sora. Not even a word."

"Won't say thing."

And that was only the beginning of what would turn out to be a very significant day in Kairi's life. Did she know it? Certainly not. Did Sora know it? ...That's just a ridiculous question. Of course _Sora_ didn't know it. But as Sora pondered hairless dolls and weekend adventures with Riku, Kairi heaved a small sigh and looked out the window of the car.

There had to be another way.

x x x

"Alright now. In urban areas, one of the most leading causes of all accidents is what? Larxene?"

"Tailgating."

"That's right. _Tailgating_. Which is a form of what?"

"PMSing."

Giggles and snickers were heard around the room, but nothing more. Really, Yuffie figured it was just like being slapped back in high school. How on earth did people see this as a punishment in the first place?

A thin line of black ink streamed across the polished wood of the desk, Yuffie watching with a bored expression as her hand took on a mind of its own, doodling and scribbling with her handy ballpoint pen. Everyone else was doing it. Maybe not on the desk, but that didn't change anything. The girl next to her was scratching at the rough edge of the desk with her fingernails, the guy in front of her was tapping his pencil eraser against the desk, the other girl beside her was just looking around the room in this weird spacey kinda way...

There was absolutely no point in going to the stupid clinic. Yuffie could probably just get up and walk right out and no one would notice a thing.

But then her attention was brought back to the Nail Girl. She really did have nice nails. They weren't the creepy long kind that were easily mistaken for claws, but they weren't stubby and non-existent either. Yuffie... definitely had nails on the stubby side. Glancing at her own hand still clutching the pen, Yuffie frowned slightly --_Eww__, ugly nails_...-- before once again glancing at the other girl's hands out of the corner of her eye.

She hadn't picked up on it before, but the girl wasn't _scratching_ the desk. She was tracing some weird invisible pattern along the edge of it and her nails just happened to scrap against the rough wood on occasion. The girl was doing the same thing Yuffie was; she just wasn't leaving marks.

And then of course, Nail Girl caught Yuffie staring at her nails and raised an eyebrow, drumming her nice set of perfectly manicured nails against the desk before bringing them to a halt. Yuffie glanced up, met her amused gaze, scowled, and promptly looked away. _Anyone with nails that nice is bound to be a stuck up bitch anyway_.

"So now I'm going to put in this video on road rage. Please pay close attention... _Larxene_."

"What? I'm _paying attention_."

"Mm."

No sooner had the lights dimmed and the screen begun to glow did Yuffie see about ten people plop their heads down on their desk, clearly uninterested and clearly intent on sleeping. If she was at all intrigued by the aspect of watching a twenty year old video on how to leave your emotional baggage out of your car, she probably would have jumped for joy because she had an excellent view of the screen, what with that guy in front of her fast asleep and all.

But Yuffie was intrigued by other things at that particular moment. ...Like the cute little folded paper frog that just landed on her desk. Feeling much like she was eighteen all over again, Yuffie carefully unfolded the frog, trying to remember how it was folded in the first place so she could put it back together.

_'You look even more bored than I do. What were you looking at anyway?'_

Narrowing her eyes, Yuffie clicked her ballpoint pen into action once again, jotting down a message in her nearly illegible handwriting. What the hell?? The Nail Girl's _writing_ was even perfect! What a total bitch. _Honestly_.

Trying (and failing) several times to refold the little frog, Yuffie just gave up, crumpled the note into a ball, and promptly chucked the wad of paper straight at Nail Girl's head. A direct hit, of course. Yuffie never missed.

_'Your nails.__ They're really scary looking.'_

Boy, did Nail Girl looked miffed. For about thirty seconds, Yuffie actually started feeling a little guilty. ...That was right before she got smacked in the side of the face by a rather wrinkled little paper frog.

_'At least I have nails. Is that really what you were looking at?'_

Whack.

_'Yes. It is. Now shut up.'_

Plop.

_'I'm not saying anything. Or haven't you noticed?'_

Smack.

_'Stop it!'_

_'Okay, okay, just cool it. Sheesh. I work at a nail salon, okay? I didn't think it was that big a deal.'_

_'I don't care. Stop writing me notes.'_

_'What's your name?'_

_'S.T.O.P.'_

_'Nice name. Mine's Kairi.'_

_'It's Yuffie, okay?'_

Yuffie was... an interesting person. Kairi could tell that from the moment she set eyes on her. ...Okay, that was probably a lie. Kairi hadn't even noticed her until she'd caught the other girl staring at her hands in the middle of the stupid driver improvement whatever.

Kairi's first though was that Yuffie was just staring into space and Kairi's hand just happened to be occupying that one little particular part of space. So she moved it. So Yuffie's eyes followed.

Kairi's second thought was that something weird must have gotten on her hand and she hadn't noticed. Maybe she had tons of dirt under her fingernails? Well, in a flurry of panic Kairi glanced at her nails an inspected them carefully. Not a speck of dirt. So what was up with this creepy stalker-girl?

That had brought about the paper frog which had brought about the notes which had brought about the name Yuffie. Which was quite an interesting name to pin to such an interesting person, so as far as Kairi was concerned, everything worked out perfectly. Well... almost perfectly. Yuffie had still said her nails were scary and that was just something Kairi couldn't stand for.

So she pocketed the crumpled sheet of paper and pretended to focus on the movie. Really, she was quite aware of the quizzical glance from Yuffie, left wondering why the note-passing had stopped. Inwardly, Kairi couldn't help but giggle and grin with triumph. Yuffie might have gotten the first laugh, but at least Kairi got the last. Or... so she hoped, at any rate.

x x x

Please understand that in the minds of these people, there is no such thing as fate. The world is too modern and the characters are too mature. ...That last one was a complete and total lie, but still. They think they're mature, therefore they think they do not believe in myths, legends, destinies, and fate. Seeing as much of any childhood is based upon these things, I suppose you could call it sad.

But then you can look upon Kairi as she stood hunched over in the late afternoon rain, waiting and waiting for the familiar little blue car to pull up. Sora would apologize profusely --perhaps there was an accident on the highway, perhaps the traffic slowed him down--, but Sora would be there. He was ever-trusty Sora. He was always there. In fact, the only time Sora wasn't there was when--

_...I'll bet he's having sex with Riku._

But here is where the possibility of something paranormal comes in. For Kairi stood rather lost and wet and miserable right beneath the sign of a bus stop. And some ways behind that bus stop stood a bench. And on that bench sat three girls. And one of them, finally feeling like she'd been carrying a world's worth of guilt around on her shoulders for being so snappy at Kairi earlier, finally stood up and trudged over, an umbrella shooting up above her and shielding her to the rain falling all around.

"Kairi, huh?" Yuffie asked. A glance out of the corner of her eye told Kairi that Yuffie was... absolutely the most uncomfortable person in the world. Her back was rigid, her arm holding the umbrella over them both, frozen in place like a gigantic ice sculpture. Absolutely petrified.

"Yeah, that's me. The wet rat. How do you do?"

Yuffie and Kairi stood side by side, silent for a few minutes. Yuffie started to fidget uncontrollably, drumming her fingertips against her thigh, her thumb hooked into the pocket of her jeans. She gnawed on her bottom lip, she tapped her orange-sneakered foot against the damn concrete with a _slap, slop, slap_ noise.

"If you're waiting for the bus, why don't you come sit on the bench with me? I have an umbrella and the bus probably won't be here for a few more minutes."

"I'm waiting for my ride. But thanks."

"Somebody's picking you up?"

"Mmhm. He's on his way."

"..." It wasn't that Yuffie had nothing to say. Yuffie always had something to say. But she'd already had to make such a huge effort to not come off as the insensitive bitch she had earlier. And though some refused to accept the fact, Yuffie was not as stupid as she looked. Glancing back and forth, up and down the street, Yuffie blinked and thought through her words, once, twice, and tree times before finally saying, "Well, looks like your boyfriend might've stood you up, Kairi. ...You're gonna get sick."

"He's not my boyfriend."

"...Your brother?"

"**No**, my **friend**. He's one of my roommates." Once again, Yuffie's mouth dropped open and words started to come out, but Kairi interjected. ...Thankfully. "And before you get all weird and start assuming crap about me, I'll let you know that he's gay. My _other_ roommate and my _other_ friend is his boyfriend. They sleep together and have a lot of sex. I do not come into the picture."

"You live with two gay guys?" Yuffie asked. It took her a moment to get the question out, seeing as there was a lot of other clutter backing up in the canals of her brain, but the right questions got out anyway. "Are they hot?"

Kairi shrugged. "...I don't know. I guess so."

"You mean you don't watch them kiss or anything? Come on, is it hot?"

"...To be perfectly honest with you, I don't think so, no. But I guess I wouldn't be one to judge, huh?"

At this point in time, I must once again point something out, simply for your benefit. As the reader, I feel that you must realize that at this point, by taking this action, Kairi made a picture of herself that was completely accurate. She drew this picture out with words and she showed it to Yuffie, trying to carefully go over the outermost lines with her, guiding the other girl step by step and trying not to lose her, for it was a very easy thing to do.

Unfortunately for Kairi, she could only draw stick figures. That, and Yuffie got lost anyway.

"Really? Why not?"

A voice from behind piped up then, older, more mature, and... strangely familiar.

"Honestly, does she have to spell it out for you?" With a turn that was completely in sync (really, Yuffie and Kairi could have won synchronized swimming awards if they'd really tried...), both Yuffie and Kairi turned to face none other than... Larxene. Right as the jeering blonde continued with, "Hey, it's not my fault you both talk so loud. She's trying to tell you she's gay, hon."

Third time being the charm, third time being the final strike, third time being the-- _whatever_ the third time was, it was the third time that Yuffie's mouth fell open, this time in something very closely related to shock.

Kairi blinked.

Yuffie blinked.

Larxene just smirked and looked as smug as anything.

"...Well she's right" Kairi added lamely.

"You're gay?!"

"Uh, yeah?"

"Aww, how sweet. Why don't you two dykes go get a room already?"

"What the--?! HEY! I'm not a dyke, you little bitch!"

"Don't call her that..."

The fourth and final voice spoke up from the girl seated on the bench, just like Larxene. The two were seated several feet apart, a distance that made the fact clear that neither knew the other, but neither was horribly uncomfortable at the prospect of sitting on the same bench as a complete stranger. ...Some people have problems with that. Obviously these two did not. This fact actually being relevant to the story, Larxene jumped a few blocks ahead of the 'not being afraid to sit by a stranger' idea to 'let's hit on the unsuspecting child' idea.

Her eyes opened wide in shock and her mouth pulled into a little smile, Larxene turned to the smaller girl on the other side of the bench. She couldn't remember her name --It was... Namu... Nibbs... Noopy...-- or where she sat in the silly driving clinic, but that was all irrelevent. All that mattered was-- "What's this? A fair maiden sticking up for poor defenseless moi? Please, madame, give me your hand and marry me now, for I want to have your babies."

Naminé --ah, that was her name...-- blinked rapidly, looking back and forth between her hand clutched in the Weird Girl's and the Weird Girl's... well... **weird** expression. With a nervous laugh, Naminé snatched her hand a way, clutching it protectively in her lap. "Um! No thanks!"

Kairi blinked again, finding her hand holding the handle of the umbrella that Yuffie'd been holding only moments ago. Rather than spending time and energy wondering how it got there, Kairi spent her moments wondering about the rather damp and unhappy looking girl now standing out in the rain, scrubbing at her eyes furiously to keep the rainwater at bay.

Removing her stubborn fists from her face, Yuffie frowned at Kairi and crossed her arms... though really, the action wasn't quite supposed to be intimidating. Just warming. Yuffie was _really_ damn cold standing out in the rain and it was _really_ damn obvious. "...Stop looking at me like that! I'm not gay!"

"Well, yeah, but you did say I could share your umbrella."

"...I...well...yeah, but...**SO WHAT?!**"

"Man, I've never seen a chick wallowing in more denial than you. How can you possibly convince yourself you don't dig that girl?" Larxene raised an eyebrow with her question, jabbing the index finger of her free hand towards where Kairi stood under Yuffie's umbrella. It was as though the other girl's appeal should have been obvious to the entire world, the way Larxene went about it. But...

"It's not that hard if you don't swing that way!"

"The umbrella's big enough for both of us..." Kairi said, ignoring Larxene's wicked smirk and turning back to Yuffie with a pleading look. "You don't have to stand out in the rain."

"Yeah, well, it's fine."

"No it's not."

"Maybe I **like** the rain."

With a pouting Kairi, a pouting Yuffie, and... a girl whose face Larxene couldn't see, she could only say one thing. "...This is like fucking Jerry Springer. Would you guys just give it a rest?"

Rolling her eyes, Larxene actually allowed conversation to fall to a halt for another moment. Her eyes then came to rest on the girl a few feet away, the one who had her open umbrella carefully propped up above her, one arm looped around the handle and clutching a sketchbook, the other working across the paper with a simple charcoal pencil. Naminé was skinny, Larxene noticed. Not the kind of skinny that made you think 'wow, that girl sure works out a lot' or 'wow, that girl sure needs to eat more.' It was simply a sort of 'damn, I wish I had that kind of metabolism' kind of skinny.

"Hey, whatcha drawing?" she asked leaning over to try and close the space between them and catch of glimpse of what was appearing on the sketch pad.

"It's nothing."

"..." Glancing back and forth between the tempting little sketch book and the tempting little girl (_perverted thoughts, Larxene, perverted thoughts_) Larxene grinned, poking teasingly at the umbrella opened above the other girl. "Not safe to draw in the rain. Your umbrella might just happen to fall over" poke, poke, poke "and your drawing would get ruined!"

"Stop it!" Naminé whined, clutching her drawings to her chest protectively and glaring icily at the evil umbrella poker.

"So cold. Sheesh." Larxene puckered her lips together into a small frown and returned to her own world under her own umbrella, one leg crossed over the other, her foot tapping either to a silent song or to the rhythm of 'too much caffeine.' "Worse than the fucking rain," she added after another moment drew by.

"Would you stop saying that?"

"What?"

"That word."

"...Fucking?"

"Yes."

"Oh. ...You don't like me saying fucking?"

"No. Not really."

"Oh. I see." _It should be illegal for people to be so easily agitated._ "So if I said, 'Damn I wish the fucking bus would fucking get here before I'm fucking fifty!' then you would--" Larxene came to the conclusion that 'fuck' was a word to delete from her vocabulary. ...Just as the sketchbook made contact with the side of her head. "Oww!"

"Please stop?" Naminé finally made eye contact with her and Larxene couldn't help but notice that her gaze was laced with... apology? _Well fuck yeah, like I **deserved** being hit with a damn book._

"Only because you asked so fu--f--_flipping_ nicely."

"Thank you."

"Whatever. Shut up and go back to your dumb drawing, kid."

"...I'm not a kid."

"Oh honestly, gimme a break, wouldja? What are you, sixteen? **Yes**, you are a--"

"I'm _nine_teen!"

"...Yeah well that was my next guess." Silence. Followed by a "...Stop _looking_ at me like that!"

Meanwhile, across the narrow sidewalk...

"Keep the umbrella!"

"No, it's your umbrella! If you're not going to share it..."

And back to our friendly bench....

"Listen, I said I was sorry already."

"No you didn't."

"I didn't? Oh. Well can I buy you a drink?"

"I don't drink!"

And...

"I don't want the stupid umbrella, okay?!"

"Yuffie..."

And **finally**...

"Guys..." Yuffie started, turning to address all three of the girls around her and trying to keep her shivering to a minimum in the process... "I don't see the bus anywhere."

"So it's a little late? So what? Lots of things are late sometimes. You know. Like sudden realizations of your absolute and unavoidable **gayness**. _Ahem_."

"I hate you! Shut up!"

"Feisty little devil, aren't you?"

"That's it, I'm so--"

"That's weird."

"What is?"

Kairi let out a small sigh, followed by an equally small shrug. "...Sora's not here either."

"Mm. Well, you can't always depend on guys. 'Specially the gay ones, hon. And here I was thinking I'dfinally found a girl with a head on her shoulders." Larxene quipped helpfully from the bench. Dropping one eyelid into a wink, she beamed and held up an index finger, wagging it back and forth mockingly. "One to avoid. Girls with brains know how _not_ to fuck around."

"Please stop saying that?"

"...Hmph."

At that precise moment, the bus rounded the corner of the street. Only a few more precise moments passed before all four of the girls were safe, dry, and warm (for the most part) inside the bus, headed home.

Kairi? She'd given up on Sora picking her up. He was definitely going to get an ear-full when she got home though...

Yuffie? Well, she was trying to figure out how the managed to end up sitting in between Kairi and Larxene on the bus...

Larxene? She was busy chatting away about nothing in particular. Perhaps to her it was a something, big or small, but to everyone else it was just a very big nothing.

And Naminé? She was thinking. And she was listening to the voice like bells that said...

"She's pretty. Why don't you like her? **I** like her. And she's funny! Funny people are _great_!"

There are some things that are preventable. With a few petitions and a few rowdy protesters, a lot can get done and a lot can be prevented. But you can't stop those who willingly plow headlong into disaster, be it the good kind of disaster or the bad kind.

"There are two kinds of disaster?" you ask.

Yes. Yes there are. You're about to hear about the good kind, because this was only the beginning.

(x) (x) (x)

_Preview for chapter two_: Was that the strange pull of friendship going on back there? Why yes it was! Our fine femme heroines (on their never-ending search to find companionship in a world that just screams "You'll be alone forever, you ass!") set out to cement this budding friendship. But Naminé's dream is about to come crashing down right on her head if something isn't done soon. Does Kairi have the answer? Does Larxene have a life? Does Yuffie have a brain? And finally... **more** from the little mysterious bell voice!


	2. Nails on the Parquet

**My Oh My**

'Nails on the Parquet'

If you were to walk down the street of Traverse Town (the downtown part, mind you, not the part specializing in garden gnomes and retired old coots) you would find a large variety of shops, businesses, and cultural extravaganzas.

Shops? Well there was the super market, the South Side Outfitter, the deli, the bakery, the Tin Whistle Soap Co. ....From there it just went downhill, so I'll stop with the shops.

For businesses there were places like Highwind Real Estate. Very small office space, very poor wages, and a very mid-life-crisis-stricken manager. Naminé worked there.

There was Bling-Bling's Nails. ...Bling-Bling herself had definitely lost some of her bling over the years, but she was still perky as ever. That's where Kairi worked.

There was Laund-Dry-Mat-O which had a strange name, a strange smell, and even stranger employees. By strange in this sense, I do mean queer. And yes, Yuffie worked there.

Now for cultural extravaganzas... Mostly there was only one. Well, actually there were two. There was Chuck E. Cheese and there was The Emporium. We all know of the evil that is a giant faux-fur mouse in a baseball cap. But it was The Emporium that Larxene walked into that Saturday afternoon. The Emporium, in case you hadn't guessed, was also where she worked.

And it was a sex shop.

I will not go into detail describing the little store. I'm sure you can all use your imaginations (rusty as they may be) and draw a sketchy picture in your mind. Lewd posters, vulgar DVDs, suggestively posed mannequins. ...The disturbing French maid costume that lurked in the farthest corners of the store, under a sign labeled 'Fetishes and Costumes.'

Yes, it was every middle-aged parent's worst nightmare.

And it was Larxene's dream job. ...Well, sort of.

"Leon! I have got the **worst** fucking hangover ever." Tossing her purse up and over the check-out counter, Larxene proceeded to flop right over on its surface and wail, "The world has gone straight to hell!"

"What now?"

Pay close attention to the boy behind the counter. His name was Leon, but before that it used to be Squall. The word around town was that he'd changed it when he came to Traverse because he was involved in some rather x-rated activities. And one day he just up and decided to lead a normal life and just like that he'd disappeared from his old apartment in Whereverhelived and changed everything.

...At least, that was what the rumors said.

And the rumors were entirely possible. More than possible, even. People can do that these days. Just up, go, and leave forever.

Leon was a pretty scary individual. He was every gay boy's wet dream and every straight girl's secret desire. And he worked as a cashier at The Emporium, selling strange little plastic things to curious individuals who most likely had no idea how to work them.

"Well. I think I found a girl who won't screw me."

"Statistically speaking, at least ninety percent of the girls in the _world_ won't screw you. Tell me something I don't know." Leon ran his fingers languidly through his hair, one eyebrow raised questioningly.

"Yes, but this one's gay. Well, no. No, she's bi."

"Like you."

"Exactly! We have so much in common!"

"She probably just thinks you're a--" Leon paused, turning his gaze towards the ceiling and looking thoughtful for a moment. "She probably just _knows_ you're a bit of a slut. Good little bisexual girls don't always go for big bad... _whatever_ you are."

"Leon, you just called me big and bad. Are you coming onto me?" Larxene grinned evilly and rested her chin on her folded arms, still lying across the counter. "You feisty little kitten."

At this, Leon couldn't help but twitch slightly and bury his face in his book, muttering darkly, "Don't you have an entire back room of sex toys to inventory?"

"Do I?"  
"You do now. Get out of my sight."

"You're not the boss of me." Larxene glared and stuck her tongue out, but nonetheless swung off of the counter, her feet hitting the floor with a muffled '_thok_!' Thankfully, the sound of Larxene's mildly-expensive boots clacking against the floor on her way to the back room blocked out Leon's words of, "What are you, six?" For certainly, had Larxene heard a comeback, she would've spent the entire day arguing.

Instead, she found herself buried in... 'toys' five minutes later. A clipboard in one hand, a pen in the other, and a small sigh with a puzzled expression. Lately she'd been having this... weird feeling.

"That's not really the way I'd put it. 'Weird feeling' I mean. ...Please, it sounds like I'm dealing with some bullshit sob story then. Haha, no. But seriously. Do you ever that that feeling that you just... Like everything you're doing in life is sort of pointless? I mean, I stand in the back of sex shops and take inventory of vibrators and... well, you don't really need to know what else. I do all this crap. I sleep with guys, I sleep with girls. We have a few laughs and everything's great, but... I dunno. It doesn't amount to much?"

It was like that. Or at least, that's how Larxene described it as. She had never really paid much mind to it. She had never really cared about the fact that she had no real friends. Everyone who could possibly count as something even resembling a friend was quickly dismissed in her mind.

Leon? He was just a frigid bastard of a co-worker.

Axel? He was just the local druggie and owner of her fine place of employment.

...And the sad part was, she couldn't really name many more than that.

With a sigh, Larxene jotted down numbers and figures, sorting through the chaos of the back room bit by bit, hour by hour. But she didn't mind. She'd get her fun later.

x x x

"Hey Kairi!" Sora greeted cheerfully.

Looking up from the book opened in her lap, Kairi blinked once and then promptly returned to the pages of text, sniffing a little with disdain. Sora let out an exasperated sigh, lowering his head and hunching his shoulders as he shuffled into the room, switching into his sad and pathetic puppy voice almost instantly.

"I'm sorry I forgot about you yesterday..." Sora began, scuffing the front of his sneaker-clad foot against the hardwood floor of Kairi's bedroom. "I really, really am sorry. I know it doesn't make it any better, but..." He had to stop and think for a moment before he managed to hopefully murmur, "It won't happen again?"

"Sora..." Kairi sighed. Really, she hadn't heard half of the words he'd said because she really had been trying to finish her book. But as long as Sora was in the room, that one simple little task would be impossible. So she just resigned to her fate and let Sora have it. It was, after all, what he'd come there for, right? "It **will** happen again. I mean, unless you guys go celibate or, or Riku gets _castrated_ or something, it is going to happen again."

"W-what makes you say that?"

"Because! You guys can't go five minutes without feeling one another up or sticking your tongues down each other's throats!" _If I was a straight girl, this wouldn't be a problem_. But reality was reality. And reality said that there was a certain point that people were allowed to reach before their patience just couldn't hold out any longer.

Kairi was well past that point.

"Sora, we really need to talk." The book was down, the frown was on, and Kairi stood up from her bed and started towards the door.

"We are talking! See, see? Talk, talk, talk! We're talking!" Sora yammered desperately, arms flung out to either side of him as he was propelled backwards towards the doorframe as Kairi drew closer.

"Sora."

"Yes?"

"...Why are you trying to keep me in my room?"

Eyes widening, Sora blinked owlishly before letting out a string of nervous laughter. "Hehehe! What are you talking about, Kairi? Keeping you in your room? Pfft! Why would I do something like--"

"So-raaaa. The water's nice and rea-- Oh, hey there, Kairi!" Riku appeared in the hallway. The only remarkably noteworthy thing about this appearance was that Riku was dressed in nothing more than a towel. ...No. No, that wasn't a towel. It was a washcloth.

"That's **IT**! Kitchen! _Now_! Both of you!"

"What? But... Kairi, the bath is--"

"I don't care! _Kitchen_! GO!"

"Okay!" both Sora and Riku squeaked in unison.

Perhaps there was something about seeing her best friends eyeing her with worried and slightly fearful glances. (It's a common known fact that female humans are capable of being one of the deadliest creatures to ever walk the face of the earth.) Or perhaps it was seeing poor defenseless Riku (words which had never been strung together before...) standing there, shifting his weight from foot to foot and still trying to cover himself up with a little bitty washcloth.

Whatever it was, Kairi's brief flash of warpath anger quickly flickered and died away, leaving her simply tired and agitated.

"...Okay." Kairi let out a deep sigh and perched on one of the four stools seated at the quaint little island counter in the center of the kitchen. It was a cute kitchen. Well, of course it was. Kairi had been the one who had color-coordinated all the place-mats, silverware, cups, wallpaper, picture frames...

"Listen guys. You are both my _best_ friends. We've known each other for a really, _really_ long time. We've lived _really_ close to each other our whole lives and these past two years, we've lived in the same condo too." Drumming her fingernails against the counter top with a set of _clackitaclackitacklack_-ing, Kairi let out another small sigh before taking in another deep breath. This was sort of harder than she'd thought...

"Annnd during this whole time, I've gotten to see both of you grow up and fall in love and get into fights and make up and everything. It's been fun, I've loved every minute of it. _Really_." It wasn't even like Kairi was lying. She was a _horrible_ liar. She was being completely, entirely honest. But... "...But..."

"Kairi?" Riku asked hesitantly, trying to prompt her to go on. Sora, it seemed, was momentarily speechless, still a bit shocked from Kairi's more-than-mild explosion moments ago.

"I think I need to find a place of my own." _There, I said it._ Averting her gaze so she focused on the gray countertop instead of her two best friends, Kairi continued on in a fast paced tone, trying to get as much in as she could while she still had the guts to do so. "So... You guys can have your privacy, you know? And I'll be able to have my privacy and..." Kairi paused, glancing at poor Riku once again who still stood facing her, clutching that sad little washcloth... "I'll be able to walk down the hall to brush my teeth and not bump into naked guys all the time." Glancing back and forth between both boys then, she tried on a small smile and hoped it would smooth things over... a little bit. "...Is... that okay with you guys?"

"Kairi..."

"We're sorry."

"Yeah. I mean, we didn't mean to bug you so much."

"Don't be sorry!" Kairi held up her hands and smiled innocently. There it was! The light at the end of the tunnel. ..._Finally_. "I'm happy for you guys, honest. But... Well, let's just say that I'm desperately falling behind on my beauty sleep. You guys don't want me to turn into a freaky old hag by the time I'm twenty-five, do you?"

"No, of course not."

"Good." _Wow. It worked. I don't believe it. I just don't believe it._ "Thanks, you guys."

"Never a problem, Kairi."

"...Can we go take our bath now?"

"...Uh. Yeah. Okay. Go right ahead."

_...But now what?_

x x x

_Asexual, far from intellectual_

_Bashing stealer, free-wheeler_

_Bats her eyes to cover up her lies_

_She's a sucker-upper, star-fucker_

_Sucker-upper, star-fucker_

_And I'm gonna blow her cover!_

"Larxene!"

"_My friend, my friend, saw you in a coffee shop, she thought you were cute, she thought you were hot_--!"

"_Larxene!_"

Opening her eyes and tugging the headphones previously covering her ears down around her neck, Larxene shot her friendly co-worker a charming smile. Leon, however, only frowned more, crossing his arms one over the other and scowling at her for all he was worth. Ordinarily, that scowl would make even the most steadfast of all men cower in fear. ...However, Larxene wasn't steadfast. She was pliable. ...And she wasn't a man either.

So ultimately, the cards played in her favor.

"Hey there, Princess," she greeted, one hand raised in a half-wave. "Something wrong?"

"...Do you get _paid_ to do that?"

"Do what? Do this?" With the same hand, Larxene flicked her wrist and pointed down towards her little silver walkman situated in her lap.

"...Yes."

"Yep! You bet I do!" A grin, a giggle, and the start of moving on hand towards the play button that just begged to be pressed.

"It's time for you to leave now."

"...What? Why? You can't **fire** me, Princess _Poutypuff_. That would be Axel's duty. And seeing as Axel manages this place about as well as a monkey manages a roomful of stock-holders, that would mean that I go nowhere." Taking Leon's silence as a cue for a victory dance, Larxene's wicked grin only widened as she leaned forward, elbows on the check-out counter and chin cradled between her two clasped hands. "Yes, I know. That was brill--"

"There's someone here to see you."

Raising a slender blonde eyebrow, Larxene craned her body sideways on the stool behind the counter, trying to see around Leon. However, all that she found was the same sex shop that met her quizzical gaze day in and day out. And really, she was starting to be somewhat concerned for Leon's mental state of well-being. ...Perhaps all her tormenting really _was_ enough to drive him nuts after all...

"...Uh huh. Well. I do believe that there's no one here except you and me. Normally I would use that line as a pickup line, but I'll just use it as a joke right now. So ha, ha, ha!"

Leon simply let out an agitated sigh and jerked one thumb towards the window, growling an impatient, "No, Larxene. Outside."

"Eh?"

There, right around the risqué mannequins and curious contraptions, straight through the layer of glass, paint, and brick stood none other than...

"Heeey, it's that little redhead from the other day!"

"...The one who won't have sex with you?"

Larxene narrowed her eyes and hopped down off the stool whacking Leon sharply on his arm as she headed towards the door, wondering how the hell the other girl had managed to find out where she worked. Really, it was sort of freaky. _Wait, no, that wasn't the point. Back on track. First thing's first, shut down __Leon_"No, no, no, that's the blonde one. Sheesh, keep 'em straight, Leon. No, this one's just not worth the bother," Larxene retorted haughtily.

"Why not?"

"She's way too smart, that's all." _Well duh. Isn't it just the most obvious thing in the world? _"Think you can handle the **rush** while I'm gone? Think you can handle being **parted** from me for all of ten minutes? Think you can--?"

"Do you think you can shut up already? I told her you'd be out in a minute. A minute. As in _one_. Not five. Get out."

Blinking once, twice, then three times, Larxene finally let out an indignant little sniff and turned her nose upwards, once again resuming her stride towards the doorway with yet another sharp comeback.

"Well _sorry_. Hmpf. Who lit **your** tampon on fire?"

Leon stopped her once more however, just as she'd reached the door, one hand poised to shove it open and step back out into the normal world. The one free of fetishes, porn, and costume kinkiness.

"Listen, Larxene. She's a friend of a friend and she's in a bit of a jam."

"...You have _friends_?"

"Could you stop with the jokes for a minute and try to be serious?"

"Alright, alright. Ramble on, I'll all ears." Larxene rolled her eyes in an old teenage-melodramatic style and crossed her arms, leaning against the wall and ensuring that she stood just out of Kairi's line of view. Leon could tend to ramble on for a while when his conversational juices really got going. ...That was a complete lie. Larxene knew it. But she did her best to amuse herself in any way possible.

Usually, those ways just happened to result in Leon's humiliation. But while she mused over these facts of her life, Larxene didn't see the pothole in her road. Guess who put it there? You have one guess. ...Yes, you got it right.

"Let her room with you in your apartment for a while. Just until she finds a place of her own. Is that okay?" Leon asked.

..._HUH?_

"...Ahh, so she got in a fight with her little chauffer. I got it."

"Larxene..." Leon's voice had that sharp warning tone in it... _great_....

"Okay, okay! Serious! I'm serious!"

"No, **I'm** serious. Don't try anything funny. No drugs, no sex, no booze, no... Just..." Leon trailed off for a moment, letting out a small sigh as he closed his eyes and rubbed his temples with his fingertips, trying to think just a little clearly. "For a few days, weeks, whatever... just try _not_ to be you."

"Leon, Leon, Leon. Where's your faith in me?" Larxene asked, her eyes wide and innocent but her tone sarcastic and mocking. It was all Leon deserved, as far as she was concerned. _Let him worry_. "I wouldn't hurt a **fly**."

x x x

It turns out that Leon's friend-of-a-friend, a.k.a. Kairi, was in a bit more of a tight spot than had been alluded to. In fact, the moment Larxene had set foot outside of The Emporium, she couldn't help but raise an eyebrow at the little red-haired girl clutching a suitcase in each hand and a hopeful smile on her face. That was that. With a sigh and a typical roll of the eyes, Larxene's world had reached point number two.

...How many points are there in the average person's world?

There is no limit. But that was point two. It's all you need to know.

At any rate, Larxene chose that moment to call it a day. Blaming Leon for bringing her the girl in the first place, Larxene darted inside The Emporium and darted right back out, hardly even given her only other co-worker so much as a goodbye. ...Really though, Larxene was just in a hurry to get Kairi away from the sex shop. That fact alone was enough to confuse Larxene to pieces, for normally she was proud to be an employee of The Emporium. After all, who wouldn't want to work for one of the most controversial stores in such a backwater little town?

But for reasons unknown to anyone at that particular chance moment in time, Larxene didn't want Kairi hanging around. At least, not there. She made an effort to file the topic away in her mind and think about it later. It wasn't often that she did things like that, but she wanted to figure it out. In fact, she felt that it was almost as though it was her duty to figure it out.

They walked hurriedly, Larxene leading the way and Kairi jogging to keep up with the taller girl. There should have been questions, perhaps --"What happened? Why do you need to stay with me?" "Where do you live? How far away is it?"-- but there somehow wasn't much of a need for them. At least, at that moment, neither girl really deemed the questions to be at all important.

The important thing for Kairi was trying to regulate her breathing so she didn't pass out after jogging nearly seven blocks while carrying two rather large and bulky suitcases. But it wasn't over. Up a small flight of concrete stairs, through the double glass doors into a rather dingy lobby, empty then, up four more flights of stairs, down one hallway, around a corner, down another hallway and --pant, pant, pant-- finally coming to a halt in front of the door with the little plastic numbers which quite boldly stated: A 412.

No sooner had Larxene opened the door and stepped inside, motioning for Kairi to plop her bags on the floor... Kairi was hit by the realization of what she'd just accomplished. And damn did it feel good. Standing there just inside the doorway of Larxene's apartment, Kairi honestly thought she would keel over just from sheer relief. She was in an apartment. She was away from her 'extended-family' for good. She was, in her mind, setting it out on her own. Starting a clean slate, starting from scratch, starting anew.

And best of all, the little tiny apartment felt... _feminine_. Somehow. _Weird_. But comforting weird.

Mistaking Kairi's shocked look for one of horror, Larxene simply shrugged, frowned, and then muttered, "...Okay, so it isn't home sweet home. Adjust."

"No! It's awesome!" Kairi was quick to exclaim, prancing into the middle of the apartment after sliding her feet out of her shoes. _Feet in socks on the hardwood floor, slip, slip, sliiiiiide. Hehehe!_

"...Why do I not detect sarcasm in your voice? Are you okay?"  
"I'm _serious_, Larxene. Thank you."

"...O-kay, sure, no big." Larxene could only bring herself to watch in blind confusion as Kairi gleefully flew about the tiny living room/kitchen combo, having every bit the excitement and attitude of a little kid in a candy shop. Closing the door to the apartment, Larxene said, "Uh, I've got a futon in the linen cupboard in the hallway. Or you can have the fold-out couch. Pick your poison."

"Futon's good. But I can get it! Don't put yourself out or anything!" Already Kairi was zipping off towards the hallway, but skidded to a halt as Larxene cut her off, waving her hand dismissively as she walked past the other girl.

"Cripe, lay off the speed already, Pooh-bear. I'm just getting a stupid futon, I'm not climbing mountains or anything."

"...Pooh-bear?"

"Yeah. Pooh-bear. Ya know. That squishy and stupid cute thing?" Kairi heard the soft thud of the foamy futon hitting the floor as Larxene tugged it out of the tiny linen cupboard. The closing of one door, the closing of another door, and before she knew it Larxene was wandering back into view with a rather comfy looking futon clutched in her arms.

"Are you saying I'm squishy, stupid, and cute?"

"Well if the shoe fits." Tossing the futon on the floor, Larxene soon followed the motion and flopped down on top of it as well, Kairi finally coming to a halt and sitting on the floor to face her as she started talking. _Questions now? Where do the questions start? Where does anyone start with these things? How do you ever really start meeting someone right off the bat like this? _"Hey, listen though. I think I should probably let you know... Sometimes things can get a little... hectic around here, m'kay?"

"Hectic like..?" Kairi cocked her head to the side, waiting for Larxene to continue and quite clearly a bit lost.

"Well..." In a flash, Larxene had a change of heart and a change of mind. Simultaneously. Convenient, no? "Aw, nevermind. It's not important." Kairi blinked. Larxene blinked. She then promptly declared the moment fit for her own questions. "So what happened? Your pimping boyfriends finally kicked you out?"

"No! They'd never do that!" At that, Kairi smiled slightly and held her head up, proudly stating, "For your information I left them. They need their privacy and I need my sleep."

"Oh. _Sleep_. Got it." Larxene snickered and winked, but was surprised to see Kairi frown slightly and shrink back a bit. Her reproach was kind, but still biting. And as everyone knows, it's usually the kind sort of rebuke that hurts the worst of all.

"Larxene, Leon promised me you wouldn't..." Kairi hesitated, not wanting to accuse, but not wanting to let it slide. The age-old problem easily summed up with "..._you know_."

"I'm not going to try and put the moves on you if that's what you're talking about. **Honestly**. Why does everyone assume that I want to molest and violate everyone within a ten foot radius?"

"I'm sorry..." The room fell silent for a moment, each girl regarding the other and each girl thinking, thinking, and thinking. There were some doubts and there were some hopes. But somehow they each came to the conclusion that, okay, that was a bit of a mess up. _We won't do that again? We can make this work. _

_ I'm lonely._

_ I'm homeless._

_ United we're unbeatable!_

It was Larxene who broke the silence, leaning back on one elbow resting on the futon, waving her free hand to banish the topic once again. It must have been a magic trick, really. The innate ability to dismiss topics on a whim. "Eh. I was just blowing off steam. But let's just get a few things straight, okay? That way we can both survive."

"Survive?"

"Yeah. Survive." Counting off her rules on one hand, Larxene went through it in a very smooth and routine matter. Kairi almost got to wondering how often she had people randomly show up to stay in her apartment for a few weeks. "Rule number one: If my bedroom door is closed, don't open it. Rule number two: If the phone rings, don't answer it. And rule number three: If the doorbell rings, don't answer it."

"...That's it?"

"Yeah. You got any rules you wanna set out? If you do, now's the time to say so."

"Um. No, I don't have anything. I'm fine."

"Suite yourself. But don't come wailing to me when you get stuck with the ice cold shower following my five hour steam-bath."

"Whaa?!"

"Kidding, Pooh."

"Are you going to call me that all the time now?"

"What? You don't like it?"

"No..." Kairi frowned once more, gnawed her bottom lip, and though about it for a few more seconds before adding on, "I dunno. I don't really get nicknames all that often."

"Well I give _everyone_ nicknames. You're Pooh. Leon is Princess Poutypuff. Just Princess for short. And Axel is..." Hit by another bolt of 'I'd-really-rather-keep-it-silent' lightning, Larxene cut herself off again, already trying to think of an answer for the unavoidable question...

"Is Axel a friend of yours?"

"...Uh..." _Bah. Not enough time to think of a logical response. Damn._ "Yeah. No. I mean, he's nobody."

"...Oh." Kairi thought all this over for a moment, drumming her nails against the floor and nearly going ballistic once again as she discovered that the floor was very clean and very good from drumming her nails against. _Clickataclickataclickata_... "Sooo, if you give everybody nicknames, how about Yuffie and Naminé?"

"Who?"

"You didn't forget them, did you?"

"Ah! No! Yuffie and Naminé! Duh. No, I didn't forget them. I just... hadn't thought about it. So..." Larxene's voiced trailed off a moment and Kairi waited patiently and silently. ...Er, that is, mostly silent. Except for the insane clicking of nails. Some people get their kicks where they can, what can I say?... "Yuffie would be Ducky."

"Ducky?" Kairi made a face and shot Larxene the patented look which clearly stated 'You must me joking.' ...Sadly, Larxene was not joking. ...Not in the slightest.

"Yeah. Ducky. Like ducks. They're loud and obnoxious animals that shit everywhere."

"Aww, you don't have to be that mean to her, you know. She seemed nice to me."

"..." There were many ways Larxene could have gone about answering that. However, most of them were rude, obnoxious, or just downright mean. Yes, all of those things were general traits that seemed to just be tacked onto Larxene as easily as her name was. But it wasn't what she needed right then and contrary to popular belief, Larxene was not out to make everyone's life a living hell. ...Not _everyone_.

"Anyway. Naminé..." She trailed off into a quick thought session once more before finally nodding once and turning back to Kairi. "Naminé would be Pie."

"...Okay, and I thought _Ducky_ was bad."

"It's short for angel-pie, yanno? But Angel is..." Larxene cringed and stuck out her tongue to prove her all-too-clear point "_Yech_. What a dumb nickname." Catching that all-knowing and smug little smile from Kairi, Larxene simply glowered and added, "And that's _only_ her name because she's so snobby and prude. Like some dumb angel or something. What a _joke_."

"That's cute."

"What? My stupid nicknames?" Larxene shook her head and snorted at the very idea, biting back, "Don't take them to heart or anything. They're just names. It's like that old dead guy said. There's nothing in a name. Or _something_ like that."

"Shakespeare. Romeo and Juliet. The line about the rose and how by any other name it would still smell just as--"

"Yeeep, that's the old guy." Clambering up from her cozy spot on the futon, Larxene stretched her arms over her head and let out a small yawn. "Hey, I gotta run. You can chill here for as long as you want. If you head out, don't bother locking up, we got nothing worth stealing." "Oh, but I'll make you a temporary spare key or something while I'm out, okay?"

"Oh...um... okay. But you just got back from work."

"...Well, yeah, but my shift isn't over. I'm still making up for some hours I lost last month when I was home sick for a while." Larxene made her way towards the door as she spoke, picking up her purse from where she'd set it down on the floor and sliding it over her shoulder.

"Oh."

"Remember the rules?"

"Don't answer the phone, don't answer the door, and don't go in your room."

"Bingo."

"But what if Riku or Sora wants to call me later?"

"You have a cell phone, don't you?"

"Well... yeah."

"There ya go." Larxene grinned and opened the door, turning back just once to add, "I'll be back late, so don't wait up. Make yourself at home, Pooh-bear."

"Wait!" Pause, pivot, blink. Larxene waited. Kairi hurried on with, "One more thing."

"Well hurry, I gotta get going."

"What's _your_ nickname?"

"...Me?" Larxene brushed a strand of hair behind her ear and tugged thoughtfully on a different strand of her bangs as she pondered, pondered, pondered. "...I don't know."

"..." _Well that sort of deflates the whole thing_, Kairi thought. But apparently, it hardly fazed Larxene in the slightest, for she simply raised one shoulder in a half shrug before turning back to the doorway and making her way out.

"...Okay, leaving now."

"I'm gonna think of a nickname for you!"

"You do that, hon. Later."

"Bye, Larxene!" With the closing of the door and the sound of distant retreating footsteps, Kairi tacked on a muttered, "...You chronic liar."

x x x

Some time shortly after midnight, the door opened. And it closed just as suddenly and just as quietly and Larxene let out a quiet sigh. Maybe there was some strange part of her brain that worked to convince her that if she breathed out enough air, all the stress would leave her body right along with that carbon dioxide. It was sort of alcohol. Oxidation and all that crap.

"...Man oh man," she hissed, closing her eyes and resting the back of her head against the cool wood of the apartment doorway. It was then, in that moment of silence, that she noticed that her usual silence wasn't so silent after all. In fact it sounded almost as though someone was... breathing. _Oh. Duh._ "Kairi? You awake?" Larxene whispered into the darkness, trying to catch a glimpse of the girl curled up on the futon in the darkness. "Pooh?"

Waiting a moment and still getting no response, Larxene smirked slightly before slipping out of her mildly-expensive boots as quietly as possible (for those of you who own mildly-expensive boots, you certainly know that it's a rather difficult task) before padding quietly towards the kitchen. Opening the refrigerator, Larxene pulled out one of her customary wine coolers hidden in the far reaches of the little fridge, far from the prying eyes of the usual idiots who hung around her house. _Hm.__ Maybe I should point them out to Kairi. Eh. Then again, maybe she doesn't drink. _

_ Who cares?_

With all the weird thoughts milling around in her head and starting to mix with the light touch of alcohol and sleep-deprivation, the only thing Larxene could think of doing was... well... thinking. She was too awake to sleep and too sleepy to trek downtown for the fading glory of the night life. And so she simply settled for thinking. It was a formal thing she hated doing, but a necessary thing all the same.

Friends, or the lack thereof. Leon, Axel, Kairi, Yuffie, Naminé. Did they even count or was it really all just something completely 'null and void,' as the fine text would so bluntly put it? It was with those thoughts and that mindset that Larxene meandered over to the corner of the room were Kairi was fast asleep, huddled under the sheets and an old lifeless quilt. And it was the wine cooler that made her start to voice her thoughts and questions out loud.

"...Would you call us friends?" The first shock was hearing her own voice screaming into silence in words that, in reality, were barely audible.

"Yeah." And the second shock was hearing a response. "Why else would I be sleeping on the floor of your living room?"

"Ah..."

The sleepy shadowy figure that was, in the daylight, known as Kairi, slowly and almost sleepily sat upright on the futon. One limp hand was raised as a greeting, but Larxene could barely make it out in the darkness of the apartment. "Hey there."

"What the hell are you doing? You were supposed to be asleep!" Larxene hissed.

"I think I still am. I'm not seeing straight."

"...Huh?"

"It happens sometimes. I have dreams. Then I wake up. Then I fall back to sleep again. I wake up again and I don't remember anything." Well, judging by the slightly slurred way Kairi was speaking along with the fact that she was no longer drummer her fingertips against the floor, Larxene was actually fully capable of believing the sleep-talking girl seated upon her living room floor.

"You don't remember anything? At all?" As Kairi shook her head lazily, Larxene simply raised her eyebrows as she raised her drink to her lips once again. Interesting. "So...?"

"My dream was weird."

"Humor me, Watson. Tell me of a dream-world where men chase cars and women chase women."

"It was about life."

"What about it?"

"How to live it."

"Really. And how did this dream tell you to live your life?"

"..." For a moment, Larxene thought Kairi had fallen back to sleep on her. _Gyah, what a bummer._But after a moment, Kairi's voice piped back up, sounding more tired and far away than before, but still there nonetheless. "...Said to live it like a rock song. Loud... and imperfect. Real hard rock with real soft voices..."

"And lo was Pooh-bear a poet when half-asleep."

Figuring Kairi was too far gone to get her jokes and wisecracks, Larxene simply smirked herself and took another sip of her drink, leaning back against a wall of the apartment. She could hear the rustling of fabric against fabric as Kairi rolled over, resituating herself on her squishy futon and pulling the quilt and sheet back over her.

"...How do you live... Larxene?" Kairi's words were punctuated by yawns and tired sighs, but Larxene didn't care. If anything she was slightly amused. Still thinking, but amused nonetheless. And that was certainly better than was normally the case.

"...I think I live my life like a music video," she responded, grinning from ear to ear in the dark. "Bad music, dirty words, and always at least one naked girl dancing in the background."

"...Oh..."

Moments of silence drew into minutes of silence and once Larxene was sure that Kairi was dead asleep and her drink was completely gone, she returned to the kitchen and set the empty bottle on the counter. In the span of just a few hours, things had gone from being a horribly dull and unsatisfying routine to being a weird and puzzling mishmash of everything Larxene really hadn't been expecting.

"Hm."

It was reassuring, knowing that Kairi would wake up and not remember a thing. Not from any drugs and not from anything weird. Just from Kairi's mind working the way it apparently did. ...Yes, it was reassuring. ...Reassuring, and perhaps just a little disappointing.

(x) (x) (x)

My entire planned A/N can be summed up in one word: pleased. ...However! I feel I need to point out that the plot summary for this chapter was, of course, incorrect. Sorry about that! I had to go through two other versions of this chapter before finally settling on this one. But I'm pretty sure the next chapter should follow around these lines...

_Preview for the next chapter_: Heads will roll and ink will spill. Naminé could do with a bit of living and Yuffie could do with a bit of learning. So what's to become of one seemingly crazy and schizophrenic girl and her mismatched denying pal? The Fantastic Four isn't quite there yet. More dancing from the bell-voice is required as well as more lessons on how not to drive your car. But they'll get there.


	3. The Mental Whirlpool

**My Oh My**

'The Mental Whirlpool'

Kairi awoke to the sound of water running and fabric rustling. It was all very far away, almost too far away for her sleep-fogged mind to really process. It wasn't that she hadn't slept well that previous night. No, Kairi actually believed that the futon she was sprawled across at that particular moment in time was the most comfortable thing she'd ever slept on in her life. But what was actually the case was that she was so incredibly well-rested, having spent the first night in two years not waking up to something like...

She shook her head, cleared her thoughts, and opened her eyes. Enough of that. She was on a new page, remember?

Clambering to her feet, Kairi peered around the small living room of the apartment. It was sparsely furnished, not holding much other than an oversized black leather loveseat and two matching chairs. As she pattered over towards the bathroom, Kairi couldn't help but be amused to find that the coffee and end tables were entirely made of glass. ...Larxene was **so** not a kid person.

Knocking gently on the door, Kairi called out, "Larxene? You there?"

From behind the closed bathroom door, there came a sound of the water being shut off, followed by the steady drip, drip, dripping of the last of the shower water spouting from the showerhead. The curtain was pulled back, wet feet hit the tile floor and-

"Oh Kairi! Good, you're awake!"

Kairi blinked and turned around stupidly to find Larxene standing right behind her, a spatula clutched in one hand, a frying pan in the other. ...Wha?

"Larxene? But... Eh? If you're out here, than who's in?"

"Do you know how to make omelets?" Larxene asked. "More importantly, do you even like omelets? Honestly, I'm a horrible cook. There's bread for toast if you want some though." Linking her right arm with Kairi's left one, Larxene easily guided the smaller (and very confused, might I add) girl around the bend and into the cozy kitchenette, swinging open the refrigerator door and setting Kairi right in front of it while she continued to prattle on.

"There's raspberry jam for toast, if you want some. Eww, I don't really like raspberries, but they were giving out free samples at some store or another. Man, now I know why it was free, right? Haha, no one in their right mind would by that stuff! So don't eat it! And remind me to pitch it, would you?"

The opening of a door, the quiet scuttle of feet across the floor, hastily moving towards the apartment door. Try as she might, Kairi couldn't get a glimpse of anything other than the sad interior of a rather barren fridge. Larxene had her pinned. Dammit.

"And there's syrup, eggs, carrots, broccoli, leftover macaroni and cheese... Then again, I don't think you can really use mac and cheese to make a half decent breakfast food. But then again, lots of people like eating dinner foods for breakfast. I just think it's weird though. Way, way weird. Like those pizza bagel things, remember? 'Pizza in the morning, pizza in the evening, pizza at suppertime!' Now _that_ was a lame product. What crack-head came up with that idea?"

Another opening of a door, this time followed by a quiet and conclusive shutting sound, right after which Larxene hastily moved away from Kairi and closed the door to the refrigerator. She was entirely aware of the incredulous look she was receiving from the auburn-haired girl at that moment, but she simply acted as though nothing were out of the ordinary.

"Then again, there are people who don't eat breakfast at all," Larxene added, a careful tinge to her voice. "Are you one of those people, Kairi?"

Both stood in silence for a moment, Kairi wandering around her own head, deep in thought. _What was all that about? I know there was someone else in here, but why would Larxene care if I saw them or not? Does she not trust me? How did that weird person even get in here in the first place? Does Larxene already have a roommate she just doesn't want me to know about?_

Finally, Kairi simply shook her head slightly.

"No, I like breakfast. It's the most important meal of the day, you know. It can really mess up your entire day if you don't eat it."

At this, Larxene seemed to ease up a bit and a familiar smirk settled across her face as she set the spatula and the pan back on the counter top. Patting Kairi on the head, Larxene chuckled and briskly walked out of the kitchen area once more.

"**I** wouldn't know. I usually skip breakfast."

"...Oh."

Somehow, the two of them went about their days as though nothing were out of the ordinary. Larxene's business was just that, Kairi concluded. Larxene's business. Not Kairi's and not anybody else's. If Larxene wanted to have strangers over at her apartment in the middle of the night, she was certainly allowed to do so. Kairi was just a guest, nothing more, and it was more than nice enough of Larxene to allow her to stay in the first place. ...Yes? Good? Good.

But _somehow_, both of them managed to show up at the apartment at roughly the same mid-afternoon time frame, right before they were both to be shuffled off to the driving improvement clinic. Larxene jostled the door open with one arm, jabbering about Leon, crazy customers, and half-price sales ("If you're interested, Kairi") the Emporium was holding. Kairi, meanwhile, was juggling three bags of groceries she'd picked up on her way home from the nail salon.

It wasn't Kairi's fault, really. She just couldn't stand to see a refrigerator so sad and empty like that. After all, Sora had always ensured that their condo never run out of a lifetime supply of junk food. Kairi was used to shopping for good, cheap, and healthy food.

"But really, thanks for picking up food, hon. Do you have the receipt? I can pay you back." No sooner had Larxene stepped through the door did she begin to fish around in her purse for her wallet while Kairi wobbled over towards the kitchenette, still balancing the third bag precariously between the other two.

"It's no problem, seriously! Uh, just thanks for letting me stay and all!" came Kairi's muffled response. Letting out a deep sigh of relief, she plopped the three grocery bags on the little island counter before plopping herself down on one of the several stools seated around it. Her mind was still running mile-a-minute, falling into that old pattern of inspecting her surroundings and wondering what could be cleaned, rearranged, and redecorated. ..._Dammit, I'll never get out of the mode of living with two guys_.

But Larxene didn't give her much time for that, swinging herself up onto a stool beside Kairi. The simple action managed to trigger the one question that had been on Kairi's mind since the day before, when Larxene had first said she could stay with her. That question was 'Why the hell are you letting me stay with you?' And really, it was a very good question indeed. But... for some reason, Kairi didn't feel like asking it. It was right there, right behind her lips begging to burst out into the open, but with one look at Larxene, Kairi decided it'd be best not to ask.

Larxene's business was her own, remember? If she wanted fifty **million** strangers living with her, it was okay by Kairi. _None_ _of my business, none of my business, none of my business_. ...So instead, she settled for something else.

"Sooo... I know nothing about you."

Larxene raised an eyebrow and lightheartedly responded with, "Really? I know nothing about you either. Small world."

"Maybe... we could ask each other questions or something?" Kairi glanced at the clock above the stove. Good. They still had almost an hour to make it to the clinic. They'd at least have time to try and fill in some of the blank spaces, right? ...Kairi could only hope.

"Mm." Tapping one finger lightly against her chin, Larxene rifled through her mental list of conversation-starting questions. It was filed right past the back pick-up lines, for those of you who might be interested. "...Okay. What's one thing you've always wanted to do?"

"..." It was then Kairi's turn to think, and if there was one thing that Larxene and Kairi had in common, it was their process of thinking. While Larxene would file through questions, dirty jokes, and her mental slang dictionary, Kairi would file through old book titles, road maps, and music lyrics, looking for something she'd always wanted to do. And finally she came across a little old something she'd almost forgotten about.

But not quite.

"You remember those books... the Amazing Ramona Quimpy or whatever?"

"Ramona Quimby. Age eight? Yeah, what about 'em?"

"Remember how she wanted to squeeze an entire bottle of toothpaste? Like, get a brand new tube of toothpaste and just squirt it _everywhere_?"

"...I find it really disturbing that you remember that. So we're on the same page here and all. It's just weird."

"Yeah, well. That's what I've always wanted to do. Ever since I read that."

"Really?"

"Yep."

"...Cool."

x x x

There is a thing commonly referred to as a stream of consciousness. This stream is often responsible for many things, such as blank stares, bizarre dreams, and confusing pieces of literature. Everyone has a stream like this. In some people, it's more of a river. In some, it's more of a drain pipe. Any way you look at it, everyone has this flow of consciousness, this pattern in which the mind works and links one thing to another, stacking up and up, clicking together with a click, click, click.

Sort of like Legos. You know. Those little plastic multi-colored bricks. The choking hazards? Yeah. Those are the ones.

Yuffie was pondering all of this while waiting for the next load of laundry to finish. '_Wash dark colors separately in cool water before use. Light colors in warm water. No bleach. Tumble dry_.' And the dryer she was perched upon was indeed doing its job of tumble drying. ...Very well. A whole lot of tumbling in fact. Yuffie felt as though she was going to be tossed from the top of the stupid thing at any given second.

But back to the Legos which plagued Yuffie's mind. She couldn't help but let her mind wander back to a conversation she'd had some time long ago. ...Some time like... back in high school.

"_Hey, I haven't seen you in **forever**!"_

_ "I know! Man, my summer was such a total **drag**."_

_ "Seriously? Well I had a **totally** wicked time! I went to concerts, saw tons of movies, went out with **fifteen** different guys... It was so sweet."_

_ "Oh hey, did you ever buy that... uh... that movie?"_

_ "What movie?"_

_ "You know, the one with the elf? ...Legolas? Oh hey, spit that out! That's cinnamon gum! It causes cancer!"_

_ "Legos cause cancer? WHAT!"_

_ "Huh? No! What the?"_

Like a river that went on and on, the bricks would build up and up, one piling on top of another, one individual atom of water rushing and whirling right along with the rest. Merry-go-rounds, roller-coasters, motorcycles, and the Hot Wheels set belonging to the five year old boy from next door. The same little boy obsessed with King Kong, Godzilla, and anything and everything that results in mass destruction. The same little boy who will one day buy a chemistry set, terrify his parents, and watch in tears as they pack up the hazmat and test tubes, only to lock it away in a foot locker forever and ever.

Yes, that little boy will grow up to go to Destati High. He will try out for the blitzball team just because he wants to prove he's not a total geek. He'll blow the world away, he'll be offered a position as team captain and the school will stand with their mouths dangling open as he simply quirks his lips in a smile and walks away. He'll go to college, he'll major in education and chemistry, and he'll stand in front of a classroom of bums who only take the course because they have to. Perhaps it will dawn on him that his parents locked up the chemistry set not because they feared he would burn the house down, but simply because they worried about his mental health at succumbing to such a boring subject of specialization.

After realizing that education was quite possibly the worst path for him in his adult life (he will have never cared for the stuff at all, mind you, so why will it have changed?) he'll strike off on his own. Up and leave the school, no notice, no word, no farewell. Just gone like so many things are the moment after you open your eyes, having closed them for half a split second.

Much like the roller-coaster, the thrill of the drop and the spin of the world gone as you squeeze your eyes shut and pray to anyone you might hold faith in that you not die and that the track not break and that the bar stay secure and that the and that the and that the...

Much like the merry-go-round and much like the toy cars. They're the things of childhood and that too is gone in a flash. Just like this boy who will grow up just as all boys grow up.

He'll have never played with Legos though. Why build when you can destroy?

...Thankfully, you've managed to scramble your way through the muddled thoughts of the mind of Yuffie. It's a hard road, but don't worry. You're now set for the rest of your life. To tie this all into the story at hand, Yuffie hated her stream of consciousness. Quite sad, really. But unavoidably true. For it was her stream of consciousness that made the following events take place...

The little silver bells hanging from the front of the dry-cleaners jingled. Obediently, Yuffie hopped off her post from on top of the dryer and scurries towards the front of the cleaner's, ready to take up a new mound of clothing, tag it, bag it, and set it on a rack for later cleaning fun. Complete with a beautiful 'We Love Our Customers!' coat-hanger.

She was still knee-deep in thought about the Lego conversation from years ago when voices -two of them- prickled and poked irritably at her waking _conscious_ mind and demanded attention.

"Yuffie!"

"Oh, Yuffie!"

"Yuffie!"

One from the side, one from the front, and one from the way, way back of the dry cleaners. What the..!

"EH? WHAT!"

The elderly Mr. Tigi stared back at her with a bored expression on his face. He was a short, balding little fellow, with a head that was significantly two sizes too large for his body. ...Not figuratively speaking, either. Mr. Tigi was a very humble old man. He just happened to have a rather bulbous cranium. If you poked it just right, perhaps it would bobble around in little jerky motions while an electronic speaker said some phony recorded phrases such as, "Have a nice day!" or "Here, let me starch your collar!"

Into Yuffie's arms he thrust three articles of clothing, small, thin, and very soft.

The boy who came bumbling towards the front of the dry-cleaners at that moment seemed rather frazzled looking. No wonder. While Mr. Tigi's face was abnormally large, Irvine's face was covered with powder-white soap flakes. ...Irvine was supposed to only have been hired there for a few months while he was studying abroad. ...That was three _years_ ago. ...No one really knew anything about the whole ordeal. But no one really cared either.

"Yuffie. You left a box of soap... Open. Again." Crossing his eyes and gagging several times, poor Irvine coughed, hacked, and choked amidst the cloud of dusty soap particles that hovered around him. "Are you trying to KILL me!"

"No?"

And the girl on the other side of the counter, cocking her head to the side and smiling. She smiled, yes, but her eyes were clearly confused. Very, very confused.

"...Naminé?" Yuffie blinked and did a classic double-take, her jaw dropping open as she gaped at the younger girl who waved cheerfully at her.

"Hi there! I didn't know you worked here!"

"I don't. ...Wait, I mean, I do. ...Sorry. I'm not really concentrating too well today, I-"

"_YU_-acckkhaaa-_FFIE_! **Ackha, ackha**!"

"Irvine? Do you have asthma?"

"Keh... _ackha_! NO!"

"Then get _off_ the dirty floor, take these, put them in the back, and then _wash_ the dirty floor, m'kay?" Yuffie beamed, releasing her hold on Naminé's clothes and dropping them into poor Irvine's arms, despite his protests and curses (which, mind you, were so interrupted by chokes and coughs that they were nearly inaudible. ...Unrecognizable. Whichever. Both.)

"You sure he's alright?" Naminé peered warily around the taller girl, watching as the bumbling mass of clothing (for the sake of making your life easier, we'll just remember he's called Irvine, okay?) scuttled off towards the back of the cleaners.

"Irvine? Hah! He's fiiine. The only thing he suffers from is an ego the size of a... big... Lego castle." Yuffie said the words, she heard herself say the words, and she wondered what exactly the hell was up. Then she remembered the merry-go-round, the Lego cancer, and the little destructive boy-wonder. ...She could have took the time and effort to try and explain it to Naminé...

"Am I missing something with the Legos there?"

"Not much, actually." Or she could just let the issue drop. And Yuffie did just that. Naminé blinked a few times, watching as Yuffie's mouth twitched into a small pout, the other girl seemingly lost in thought or on such strong medication that holding a simple conversation was deemed absolutely impossible.

"Sooo, looking forward to getting your license back? Last clinic coming up today."

"I can't wait. Though honestly, I don't even get why we all got 'em revoked in the first place. I mean, you see all these things on TV, like 'Wild Cop Chases' or something, and seriously. None of us are like those guys. Why'd we get our dumb licenses revoked? All those guys got was... uh..."

"Lots of them ended up dead."

"Yeah, yeah. Well. That's definitely not the point here."

"Hey, you remember those other two girls we sat with at the bus stop? Kairi and Larxene?"

"Yeah. What about 'em?"

"...Well..." Naminé's voice took on a thoughtful tone as she twined her slender fingers through long strands of blonde hair. She tried to ignore the way Mr. Tigi was looking at her, really she did. But that little old guy was just kind creepy. She couldn't really see his beady little eyes too well through all the folds of pale skin, so instead she simply turned her back slightly towards him, focusing entirely on Yuffie as she continued quietly, "I mean, both of them like girls, right?"

"...Uh. ...Oh...kaaay."

"Yeah. Well. Um... Do you think they're...? You know...?"

"..."

"..." Naminé huffed out a little sigh, lowering her voice way down to a whisper so had not to be heard by the eerie Mr. Tigi. "Do you think they're a couple?" No sooner had the words popped out of her mouth did Naminé clap a hand over her mouth before hissing, "Oh man, I really don't mean to sound like such a nosy little snob! Really, I'm not! I just..."

Apparently, Yuffie didn't care whether or not Naminé was a nosy snob or not. Truth be told, she was actually nearly bouncing around the cleaners with curiousity, eyes wide and asking, "What, what? Did you see them... Eww, did you see them kissing or something?"

"...Uh, no. But... I saw them both walk out of the same apartment building..."

"AHAH!" There was the clue!

"What, what?" Clearly Naminé failed to see that clue.

"They're totally seeing each other. ...Ewwww." Too bad for Naminé, Yuffie's mind was already reeling forward, zipping through different scenarios she'd been told were heinous and wrong. Weird, crazy, bizarre, unnatural...?

Drawing her bottom lip into a pout, Naminé scowled and snapped, "Will you stop that? What makes you think they're together? I mean... You know. ...Not that I **care**."

"...Naminé. If I walked out of the same apartment as a boy and was rather buddy-buddy, touchy-feeling, hearts and bubbles and whatever... Wouldn't just be a smidge suspicious?"

"...Well... I suppose..."

"I **knew** they were into each other."

Both Yuffie and Naminé fell silent as a weird raspy noise finally penetrated their conversation. Blinking, Yuffie glanced over her shoulder to find the peculiar Mr. Tigi hovering only inches away. Blinking again, Yuffie scuttled forward a few steps, shuddering unconsciously as Mr. Tigi simply grinned toothily as stalked off towards the back of the building.

"..."

"..."

"...Um. Hey, sorry for keeping you from work." Naminé smiled slightly, crossing her arms and rubbing them with her hands. _Weird to be cold in the middle of spring, but some people have low body temperatures. Like alligators. ...But Naminé doesn't seem like an alligator. _

"Huh? Oh, don't apologize! Hehehe, I love getting paid for doing nothing! ...Come to think of it, that's usually what happens all the time, so this is no big deal." Clearly, between Yuffie and Naminé, neither could stay focused on any one thing for any particularly long span of time, for Yuffie was looking on at Naminé who's mind was clearly not in the little store front of a discount dry cleaners. Waving a hand in front of the other girl's empty eyes, Yuffie whistled and asked, "You there?"

"Yeah! Sorry, sorry!"

The two stood silent for another few minutes for it felt like there was something left unsaid. Neither could really put a finger on it, almost as though they were bumbling around in the dark, blindfold tied around their eyes and a tail grasped in one hand to pin on the donkey. ...Once again, that was just the way Yuffie thought of it. Realistically speaking, Naminé and Yuffie were just experiencing an awkward silence. Awkward silences are an interesting breed of creature, really.

Seemingly out of the blue, Yuffie smirked and jabbed Naminé in the elbow, raising her eyebrows and giggling. "Hey, you afraid of Larxene and Kairi?"

"What! No! Of course not!"

She continued to poke her jokingly and as Naminé squirmed to get away, she couldn't help but be reminded of that girl, Larxene, poking and prodding her while she was trying to draw that day under the umbrella, under the rain, under the open sky. The other girl just wouldn't go away.

Sort of like Yuffie just wouldn't go away. But it was a different kind of not-going-away-ness. Yet another thing Naminé couldn't seem to grasp entirely.

Meanwhile, Yuffie went on with her teasing. "Afraid the scary lezzies are gonna come hunt you out in the dark and make you one of their mindless soldiers?"

"No, I never said that!" Naminé whined, batting Yuffie's hand away determinedly. It was another nagging feeling she felt in the back of her head that something was just off about the whole situation. This time, it wasn't linked to the obnoxious presence of Mr. Tigi. It was just something about... "Yuffie..."

"What? I was only kidding."

"I know but..." Naminé sighed and shook her head slightly, tucking her hands in the pockets of her sundress and scuffing on sandal-clad foot against the still dirty tile of the floor. "...Nevermind. ...I'll see you later, okay?"

"Sure thing!"

x x x

I will take but a moment of your time to tell you one very important, critical piece of information.

Everything you have yet to read and everything you have already read up to this point may or may not be true. But it all happened. In this particular realm. What I'm trying to convey is that in the place where I'm telling you this tale from, these things happened. Someone really _did_ just shout "Sleep with her!" and someone really _did_ just mutter "What the hell..?" But maybe they didn't happen in that order.

Maybe what you've read has just been a collection of moments and histories of the entire human race, gathered from around the world. Someone has said these words before, it is all a true story, but much like a poorly written tabloid, there are holes. And there are holes because maybe, just maybe, these events are individual little islands that are in no way related.

Assuming that's the case, the people previously referred to as Yuffie and Kairi may not truly be Yuffie and Kairi. Yuffie could be made up of thousands of people. Like Sara, Amy, Tina, Jen, and maybe even Jack. Kairi could be anyone ranging from Terry to Tom and really, no one knows.

...These were Yuffie's thoughts. (I had you going as the narrator for a while there, didn't I? Hohoho.) Seriously though, Yuffie was in fact pondering all this and more as she sat across from Naminé in a dimly lit little house located precisely-

Well... we've yet to reach that part of the story. Sadly, you'll have to wait just a bit longer. But hang in with Yuffie for a moment. Stream of consciousness, remember?

Sitting at a collapsible card table on a collapsible lawn chair in a dark and eerie kitchen, Yuffie blinked, cleared her eyes, and listened to the sounds. _Clack, clack, clack_. A pause. _Shhhhck. Clack, clack, clack_. And repeated. Cucumber fresh air and tomato-basil perfume. Someone a ways away and someone else very, very close. But not much of a someone. These were the things that Yuffie felt and these were the things that unnerved her just the slightest wee bit. Almost as much as certain other things...

"So like... I ran into Larxene today at the supermarket..." Yuffie shot off into the seemingly empty and anxious air, trying to make conversation.

"Oh, did you?" Sure enough, Naminé appeared not moments later, carrying with her a small plate of vegetables and dip and setting in on the card table before seating herself across from Yuffie.

Remember the holes Yuffie was thinking about? Yes. Those ones.

Wondering how Yuffie ended up sitting across from Naminé in front of a veggie platter?

It's all about the holes, children.

"Yeah. She was buying Kairi toothpaste." The way Yuffie said it, she could've easily said 'she was buying Kairi a wedding ring.' Intriguing, Naminé noted. But she was a clever girl and chose to say nothing. Instead, the blonde girl simply held a carrot between two fingers, carefully dunking it into the ranch dip at the center of the platter before bringing it to her mouth, crunching, and then chewing thoughtfully.

Swallowing, Naminé simply said, "Everyone needs toothpaste."

"But she was just so **smug** about it! I mean... Ugh. And I asked her, you know, if her and Kairi were '_together_' and everything. Just because, you know, we'd been talking about it earlier. You and me, I mean. And so I figured, why not find out the one-hundred-percent truth, right? So I mean, I asked her and she just got all... It was like she was _bragging_! Like she was _trying_ to piss me off!" Yuffie paused and took a moment for herself, taking a deep breath, taking a piece of celery, dunking it forcefully into the dip and tossing it into her mouth. Munch, crunch, swallow, and she continued right along.

"And I mean, it's not like I honestly care or anything! What is **up** with those guys? Why do they think I care if they're weird like that? It's not like it concerns me or anything. And what's more is..." Yuffie trailed off, noticing that Naminé neither seemed stimulated nor enthralled by the conversation. "Hey, you okay?" she asked warily.

Naminé cocked her head to the side slightly, her expression blank. After a moment of thoughtful silence, she asked, "Have you ever met someone and felt that you could trust them? Like... without even knowing them, just felt this click? Sort of... 'I have to tell this person _everything_.' Have you ever felt that?"

Yuffie frowned slightly, her brows furrowing together as she thought back on the countless people she'd met. Really, she hadn't known anyone like that through high school. At least, no one who's name she could remember. There'd been Tifa and Aerith... Both of them were nice, but there'd never been a 'click' like Naminé had described. _But there'd been that girl... What was her name?_

"I don't think so. I mean, no one really comes to mind or anything." Yuffie thought for another brief moment before nodding twice in affirmation. Nope. There wasn't any clickage in Yuffie's memory.

"Really?" Naminé blinked, a carrot piece held between two fingers, hovering over the dip like a bird of prey. Poor dip. It didn't stand a chance against two hungry girls. "The weird thing about it all is that I've heard about it. The click, you know. It's not like... romantic or anything. You get what I'm saying, right?"

Yuffie nodded.

"Because I feel that click with you."

Yuffie blinked.

"I don't know why." After this, Naminé let out a little sigh, her mouth puckering into a soft frown as she continued quietly. "Despite your being the most egotistical, self-centered, loudmouthed and homophobic person I've ever met, I really feel like I could tell you anything."

"_HEY!_ What about Larxene, huh!" Yuffie's expression was some vicious combination of a pout and a glare, all rolled into one. ...Not particularly menacing, but still none too happy.

Naminé, however, simply giggled and shook her head, saying, "No, Larxene's not a homophobe, I don't think. I _do_ think she's more egotistical and self-centered than you, maybe. But I don't know..."

"...Um, hello? What about the loudmouth part, huh?" Yuffie pressed.

Naminé just smiled and shook her head, holding up both hands in front of her defensively. "I think I'll plead the fifth on that one," she said, much to poor Yuffie's dismay. Once the muttered curses and threats coming from the older girl had died down, Naminé cleared her throat, and looked Yuffie straight in the eye, continuing her explanation.

"So you see, the thing is... I haven't really lived here long. I just moved because my old real estate agency went bankrupt and this was the closest place with an opening. I don't know anybody and I've got no one to really talk to. Except for this one... 'person'..."

"A boyfriend?"

"No."

"...A gi... a gir.. giiiirrr..."

"Girlfriend? No."

"Phew."

Rolling her eyes, Naminé let out a bigger, deeper sigh, seemingly attempting to just kick all the old air out of her lungs and start again. But the stuffy air in the room allowed for no such feeling of rebirth and Naminé was still stuck swallowing stale oxygen. Even then, nothing could really be done to ease the blow her next words had on Yuffie, who was, at that particular moment, attempting to eat a piece of celery without the use of her hands. A rather amusing sight, really. But I digress.

"I think I might be going crazy."

Yuffie blinked and raised an eyebrow.

"I hear voices..."

Yuffie's eyes widened slightly and the celery stick stopped edging further into her mouth.

"And..." Naminé trailed off, her gaze fixated on the surface of the cheap card table. For half a moment, silence filled the entire room. A thick silence, a stifling silence. The kind of silence that would make people burst into fits of nervous laughter were it not for the fact that it was just so danged uncomfortable.

And then the silence ended.

"Yuffie, right?"

It came from behind and Yuffie turned to see who had snuck up on her and Naminé.

No one was there.

But the voice sounded an awful lot like...

...Bells?

Yuffie turned back around in her seat, celery stick still hanging from her mouth. But once she turned back around... Well... Let's just say the dear old celery still fell right out of her mouth at the precise moment her jaw dropped open in shock.

"Hi there, Yuffie! I'm Cloud!"

(x) (x) (x)

I was going to put another scene in here annnd then I didn't. XD Sorry all. It just won't fit in quite yet. Next chapter maybe. Probably the chapter after that, most likely. So sorry for the short chapter, but ah well. What're you gonna do, right?

...And Mr. Tigi is my masterpiece. Hehehe. That's about all.


	4. Da Vinci Pie

**My Oh My**

'Da Vinci Pie'

There's a particular feeling that come across as being indescribable. Perhaps it's a physical pain, but it goes deeper than just skin-deep. Far past muscle-deep, maybe even beyond gut-deep. Combined with a headache, it all makes for a very upsetting combination at any time of the day, week, month, or year. Not something you want to get, really. Ever.

Sadly, Kairi was experiencing this feeling just as another customer walked away from her table, nails glimmering a deep crimson, pared and filed to perfection, neatly rounded creations that stretched out just past the very tips of the woman's fingers. Kairi sighed, folded her arms, and plunked her head down on this makeshift cushion of hers. Pain.

"Hey babe, you okay today? You look a little out of it." A slender hand rested on her shoulder and Kairi turned her head to the side, bangs falling over her eyes, but still able to make out the figure of her boss standing over her.

For those of you who have never met someone of extreme beauty, let me tell you right now that you are incredibly lucky. Now I'm not talking about pictures of movie stars or pop singers. I'm not talking about TV or the Oscars. All of those people have the power of Professionals on their side, more specifically, the power of Cosmeticians, Plastic Surgeons, and of course, THE MEDIA. With caps for emphasis. There is no other way to say it.

There exists a rare breed of people, though, who do not become famous and who do not hire Professionals to do scads of work on making them beautiful. These people have a beauty that hovers over them like a curse, turning heads and spiting dirty looks, lewd comments.

Bling was one of these girls. Her beauty was so irrational and so overpowering that it is impossible to put it in words. Her figure was perfect, but not the standard idea of perfect. Perhaps she was she was slightly plump, perhaps she was too slender. Perhaps her hair was brown, blonde, or red. But listen. It makes no difference. Can you picture her?

Good?

Good.  
Behold. This is the kind of person who makes you hate living, just because they exist.

Kairi gave Bling a weak smile and hauled herself upright, not wanting to look like she was slouching on the job or anything. As kind and easygoing as Bling was, Kairi was still just an employee, and that was a fact that Kairi could never shake, no matter how many times Bling tried to assure her that she treated all her employees as equals, not subordinates.

"Hey Bling. Don't worry about me. I'm just a little tired."

Bling smiled. The kind of smile that could kill, not because it was terribly venomous, but simply because it could break the heart of any young girl, knowing they could never be so pretty, or any young boy, knowing they could never be with such beauty. It hardly fazed Bling at all, though.

"Tell you what, hon. It's kind of a slow day. Whaddya say you take the rest of the day off, head home and get some sleep? You've put in your share of hours this week."

Kairi blinked. "No I haven't. I've only worked thirty two."

"We'll round it up!" Bling chuckled, her smile turning into a beaming grin.

And so it was that Kairi took the rest of the day off. Out four hours early, heading around back to the small parking lot the strip mall had to offer for the people who worked there. With a shaky smile (for indeed, that incredible feeling of 'ick' still hung over her), Kairi made her way over to her precious car. Actually, it really wasn't much. Some raggedy old wreck she'd gotten for a bargain at a used car lot, but it was had four wheels and it drove just fine. And it was blue.

And she had her license back. _Ah, precious license_.

But...

_That's weird. ...I guess I just don't feel like driving today..._

It wasn't that she didn't remember how to drive the car or that the weather was so nice outside that she simply couldn't drive the car. It was just that... Well, Kairi just didn't **want** to drive the car, that was all. But it was just so strange... _I was dying to get my silly license back just a few days ago, and now this? Hmph. Maybe it wasn't even worth all the trouble._

x x x

Kairi arrived at the apartment to find Larxene lying there, sprawled across her black leather sofa, hands clasped over her stomach. Not a 'hello' or a 'how-do-you-do' to be found within the room. Just a "You drink?"

Yet for some reason this didn't bother Kairi in the slightest. Over the past several days, she'd almost grown used to the nature of the older blonde woman, cold at some times, flaring and burning at others. Shrugging her purse off and leaving it by the front door, Kairi then slipped one foot and then the other out of her strappy black sandals, responding to Larxene's question with a noncommittal, "Almost. Just twenty. In a year, maybe."

Larxene was quiet, her gaze seeming unusually intense for staring at a ceiling, which is what she appeared to be doing from Kairi's point of view. It was then that she noticed the various bottles of wine coolers scattered about the coffee table, almost as though they were like socks in the drawer of a dresser. Meaning that they kept reproducing. How it was that she got into the reproduction of socks, Kairi would never ever be able to figure out. She'd been having weird thoughts like that lately...

Come to think of it...

Kairi blinked, startled to find herself lying on her stomach on the futon of hers set up in the little living room of the apartment. Opened to the centerfold in front of her was a magazine, clearly portraying some model or another. Sparkling eyes, gleaming hair, flawless skin. One look at her teeth though and Kairi knew the poor girl was bulimic. _When you throw up so often, your teeth start to grow discolored from exposure to all the stomach acid.__ And when you try and bleach over it, they look funny. They always do. Some mistakes you just can't cover up._

"...Listen, Kairi..." Larxene started warily, her voice guarded. Aha. Kairi had known something was eating away at her friend from the very moment she'd walked through the door. "A few days ago, when you woke up... There was someone else here in the apartment, you know... And"

"You don't have to explain anything, Larxene. This is your apartment and"

"Would you just _listen_ for a second? ...I'm sorry for acting weird, okay? I mean, don't get used to me _apologizing_ or anything, because it doesn't happen. So don't like... **expect** it anymore or anything. Just... Sorry the rules are the way they are. And it doesn't seem fair. And I'm done." As though backing up her last statement, Larxene shifted her arms so they lay folded across her chest, eyebrows draw together with concentration and mouth curled into a stubborn frown.

"I'm not _mad _at you," Kairi insisted, barely able to keep an amused smile from her face.

"Yeah, yeah, I know. You're just as sweet as pie, aren't you?" Having given her hourly dose of sarcasm, complete with the over-dramatic roll of the eyes, Larxene rolled over onto her own stomach and buried her face under one of the sofa cushions. _Lucky for her she has a late shift at her job tonight, huh?_

While Kairi was normally content to sit still for hours and do nothing but think (for indeed, sometimes spare hours just popped up and the thinking was there to be done), there was a magazine in front of her. And as a devout follower of 'magazines-are-the-bane-of-human-existence,' Kairi was both shocked and appalled. At the same time. She wasn't even sure how it'd gotten there in the first place. Or how she'd gotten there... Man, it was like she'd been walking around in some sort of dream for the past few days.

There, real, and experiencing things... but somehow... _not_ there. Invisible? No...

"...Hey Larxene?" Kairi tried to will herself to close the magazine, but it just wouldn't work. She simply blamed it on the evils of mass media and turned her head to face towards where Larxene was splayed out face-down on her couch. "Do you ever feel like you're walking around in circles looking for something, but you just can't find it?"

"Only every fucking day of my life," came the muffled response.

"...Do you think we'll ever find it?"

Here Larxene seemed to actually pause to think a moment, something she rarely did. It was weird, the way that worked. On a regular basis, she didn't give a damn what she said to people or what lousy advice she gave. But with Kairi it was a little different. With Kairi, she actually would have felt somewhat responsible if the girl took her lame advice and petty words seriously, so it was best to choose them at least a little more carefully.

"It depends. Some people do. More probably don't." Rolling over again, Larxene sat up and peered over the back of the couch, looking down at Kairi as she continued, "Eventually you get to a point in your life where maybe everyone you're surrounded by has one solid thing grounding them here on earth... except you. That's when you become a bitter old witch."

"That's not true."

"Oh really? And why not?"

"Well... just because you can't find whatever it is you're looking for, that doesn't mean you can't live a happy life." Kairi spun a cheap silver ring round and round her thumb, a nervous habit she'd picked up years ago from Sora, when he first started wearing the little rings and trinkets Riku would give him.

"Never said it wouldn't be happy. But pointless, yes." Larxene studied Kairi carefully, trying to gauge the girl's reaction. After another moment, her voice took on that brick-like tone, the one that warned Kairi that they were both walking on shaky ground. Nonetheless, Larxene talked on anyway, watching Kairi spin her thumb ring around over and over again in the meanwhile.

"I once knew this woman. The really old, but really sweet type, you know? I used to go visit her sometimes when I was in high school. My mom always made me bring her cookies or something. I think my mom felt bad for her or something... maybe because she was so old, maybe because she lived there all alone. But once a week her granddaughter would go and visit her. So between me and this granddaughter of hers, I didn't think she had it so bad."

"...What happened?"

"Oh." Larxene blinked, almost as though she were surprised that Kairi had spoken at all in the first place. Then, she very calmly and very clearly stated, "She killed herself. She had someone help her, you know. I dunno. That was around the time I graduated and my mom headed back to her hometown. Eventually this tiny hole in the wall loses its luster. That's when everyone leaves."

"...I'm sorry."

"What the hell are you sorry for? **I'm** not feeling bad about it. That lady was miserableshe _wanted_ to die. She told me she would stop taking her meds to try and speed it up, but every time she did, something happened, she got sent to the hospital, pumped full of the stuff, and sent back home with a lecture from a doctor. Over and over and **over** again." Larxene jolted into silence, some back corner of her mind sulkily questioning why she'd gone so far in the first place. "What kind of life is that?" she asked gloomily, resting her chin in the cradle of her arms.

"Why would anyone want to live so long with nothing to live for?" Kairi prompted carefully, glancing up at Larxene as she did so. Apparently she'd hit right on the mark, for Larxene nodded sharply, meeting Kairi's eye once again.

"Exactly."

"...Maybe that's where your searching comes in. Even when you get that old, maybe you have to keep looking." _There's got to be a reason behind this... Larxene doesn't strike me as the type of person to just up and talk about something like this for no reason at all other than idle chitchat. ...Mm... Wish I could just sit still and think..._

Almost as though she'd read Kairi's very thoughts, Larxene disappeared from view once more as she flopped over on the couch again, the muffled sound of her voice making it clear that there was yet another pillow crammed over her face. "...I'm sick of talking."

"No you're not. You're just afraid I might have a point."

"Like hell you do. I'm tired, Pooh. Scram."

"I don't think so. I told you already, we're friends, right?" Taking a deep breath, Kairi released her grip on her thumb ring and pouted slightly, even though Larxene couldn't see it due to both the position of the couch and the pillow covering her head at that moment. But the brave and relentless Kairi trudged onward, ever-stalwart and determined and... all of that.

"Well part of friendship is annoyance. Time to suck it up and deal with it," she said.

At that precise moment, the phone rang. Delighted, although still somewhat sloshed from her bout with the wine coolers, Larxene took the opportunity to avoid revealing more of herself that she'd like to and sprung up off the couch. "Oh look, the phone. Better answer it, you know. It could be someone important." Hurtling across the room, Larxene nearly collided head on with the wall before she wrestled the phone from its cradle and clamped it to her ear. "Hello?"

Meanwhile, Kairi watched on, seemingly uninterested and maybe even slightly disappointed. _What is it that she keeps trying not to tell me?_ But whatever it was would clearly have to wait, for as she watched Larxene on the phone, it was perfectly clear to Kairi that Larxene's mental gears weren't even fazed by the alcohol, for they were whirring at a very tremendous rate that even Kairi could pick up on from across the room.

"...Uh..." Larxene twirled the phone cord around her finger, smirking, smiling, grinning... somehow all at the same time. "Yeah. ...Uh huh. No, no, you got it right. ...Eh? ...But..." One eyebrow raised then and her mouth finally made up its mind, settling on a satisfied smirk. Of course. "...Oh really? Well I'm very flattered and everything but... Nonono! I'll be right there."

"Who was that?" Kairi asked, fixing her gaze back on the accursed magazine in front of her. She tried to make a mental note to burn the thing when whatever spell it had over her was broken, but for some reason the mental note just didn't stick.

"Naminé. I _totally_ knew she was into me."

This... surprised Kairi to say the absolute and very least, and as Larxene zipped off towards her bedroom, Kairi's eyes widened, the girl grabbed the magazine (_Dammit!_) and raced off after her friend. "What'd she ask you?"

"Wants me to go over to her place, duh."

Having never really been in Larxene's room before, Kairi hesitated a moment before skuttling on inside. She cautiously perched on the edge of the bed, almost as though the entire thing was ready to just up and devour her in a flurry of sheets and pillows at any given second. The very thought caused Kairi to shudder, but she tried to put it out of her mind. ...For the moment.

Larxene's room was set up in such a way that the low-set bed was tucked off in a far corner, the decor sticking to plain, simple, and altogether very modern tastes. A plain flower vase with a handful of long dried grass-blades in one corner, a tall mirror in another. A short hallway, no longer than three feet or so, branched off further into the room, into what appeared to be some sort of closet space. But past that, Kairi could see. And of course, it was where Kairi couldn't see that Larxene's voice bubbled up from.

"Is she a skirt or pants kinda chick?"

"...I dunno. She wears sundresses, doesn't she?"

"Hmm..."

The room grew silent for a moment, except for the clang of coat hangers and the rustle of clothing from off where Larxene was. Kairi sighed and made herself comfortable on the other girl's bed, flipping open her magazine once again. _Oh hell, I don't even remember where I was._ Gone was the hope of being able to just get the magazine over and done with quickly. Now she'd have to start all over again from the beginning.

Continuing from where they left off advice-wise, Kairi called out to Larxene, "Besides, I think you're more experienced with this stuff than me. I mean, I've had like... **two** girlfriends in my _entire_ life. And both of those were pretty sad and pathetic."

"What, they weren't gay enough for you?"

"...Yeah, actually. They were both straight. Or just curious." Kairi sighed and flipped another page in the damned magazine. She just couldn't put it away. ...Even though she could practically _feel_ her brain oozing out the side of her head as she glanced over various shampoo and makeup ads.

"Man, that blows." Finally Larxene reappeared, dressed in a pair of jet black corduroys, a strappy dark green tank-top and two thin leather bands strapped to each wrist. "Whaddya think?"

"Um...?"

"Too butch?"

"Nooo...?"

"Perfect." Disappearing into her little closet nook once again, Larxene raised her voice just enough to carry across to Kairi once again as she said, "Hey, tell ya what, Pooh-bear. How about if I pull a couple strings and see if I can hook you up with that annoying little number you kept staring at back at that lame-ass driving clinic?"

Had Kairi had anything in her mouth, she certainly would've choked and died. Thankfully there was nothing in her mouth. "Yuffie!"

"Was that her name? Yeah, that one."

"Just what I need, _another_ straight girlfriend."

"Hey, hey, hey. Say what you like. That chick is totally into you." Poof. Larxene was back, a lightweight black jacket being tugged over her shoulders. The thing was purposefully cut too short, the hem of the jacket only reaching the base of Larxene's ribs. Making a face, Larxene once again asked for Kairi's input. "Jacket?"

"Larxene, I don't mean to burst your bubble, but I don't think Naminé would call you just to invite you over for"

Deciding on her own that the jacket simply would not do, Larxene tossed it off to the side, adding to the growing mound of clutter that seemed to be collecting back over by her closets. Spinning around once in the wall-length mirror, Larxene blatantly ignored anything Kairi had to say on the subject, flashing a grin and fluttering her eyelashes mockingly at her reflection. "What was that? My oh my, yes. You **are** sexy, Larxene. Oh, I'm sorry, did you say something?"

"...No, not at all. Just little old me reading a magazine," Kairi muttered, turning another page. Oh look, an article on how not to wear a bikini. Kairi would certainly put this information to good use. _Being flushed down the **toilet**! GAH._

"Great. Now remember the rules."

"Don't answer the phone, don't answer the door, and if a door is shut, don't open it."

"Perfect. If Leon leaves a message, pick up the phone before it clicks off and tell him I'm tossing my cookies in the toilet and can't come to either the phone or The Emporium, m'kay? And if I'm not back 'til late, don't worry, got it? Just getting a midnight snack."

"A slice of Pie and a glass of milk, right?"

"You catch on so quickly, dear. _That_ is why we get along oh-so-famously."

x x x

Naminé had an apartment. This size of this apartment could roughly be compared to that of the downstairs area of your standard single-family home. ...The downstairs area of your standard single-family home when folded up into a paper crane and hastily slid through the paper shredder and cut into tiny little pieces, for indeed the apartment was very tiny. And much like the metaphorical wastebasket full of these paper-strip-apartments, Naminé's own apartment was absolutely covered with... clutter.

However, never before had Larxene set eyes on such artfully arranged clutter.

There were books (some of them new, some of them old, some of them with torn spines or missing covers) neatly stacked across the coffee table, a folded sweatshirt and an empty shopping bag seated on top of those. Hat boxes of various shapes, colors, and sizes (Where they arranged in color order? Any scheme in the planning? Triadic, monochromatic...? What, what?) Stripes, polka-dots, patterns left and right and everywhere she looked. Photos in lines across the floor, pinned to walls. Paintings and blank canvases stacked up in separate piles, paint tubes neatly cleaned off but clearly half empty.

Rugs, rolled out, up, and backwards.

Mirrors, standing, hanging, and even broken (the pieces, mind you, lying assorted in a tray aside a series of melted marbles and sea glass.)

Sofa covers, water bottles, paint cans, drafting table, pastel pencils, colored pencils, ebony pencils, graphite, charcoal, markers, crayons... Why was there so much **STUFF**?

Needless to say, Larxene was shocked. Just shocked. Upon stepping through the doorway as Naminé smiled warmly and welcomed her inside, Larxene just couldn't keep her mouth from dropping open with that very shock.

"God, your place is an absolute sty!" _Brill.__ You're suave. Now tell her that she has eyes as beautiful and as clear as a mud puddle._

Rather than taking offense as any sane hostess would have, Naminé simply blushed a little and laughed, saying, "Sorry for the mess. And for the short notice. See, normally I clean up before I ever have anyone over, but I still haven't really gotten around to organizing everything since I moved in." Hesitating a moment, Naminé continued with, "But then again, I guess I didn't figure I'd be staying here too long."

"Hey, don't worry about the organizing," Larxene chuckled, making herself at home and plopping down onto the sofa, Naminé following suit, though without the plopping nature. "But... you weren't planning on staying in town?"

"No, no! That's not it! I just was hoping I wouldn't be staying in this apartment very long. I really wanted to buy a house when I first got here," Naminé said, brushing her hands across her legs to smooth her skirt out. It was only then that Larxene took such a notice in what Naminé was wearing.

A plain corduroy skirt, nor frills, no nothing. Just a plain skirt and an oversized button up paint shirt that hung off of her small body like a giant potato sack hanging off of a wet kitten. ...All right, maybe not quite like that, but similar. The really strange this about it was that the whole thing looked alarmingly... nice on Naminé. Almost like a second skin the girl grew in the springtime. ...But again, not quite. Larxene just couldn't place it.

Even with dried splotches of paint clinging to her clothing, Naminé still had that weird appeal that had hooked Larxene in the first place. _Hah. Talk about crazy. Man, I gotta go start seeing that shrink again._

"So what's the occasion?" Larxene asked, clearing her throat with a little cough and allowing a small smirk to creep up onto her face. _Lucky for me I spritzed my mouth with that super-strong super-painful mint breath-freshener. ...Oh crap, I hope I did. I think I remembered to. ...Dammit, not way to check now without looking like an idiot. Shit._

"Actually, I was... um... See, I was sort of hoping you could maybe... help me with this project I have." Naminé twisted her hair back into a ponytail with both her hands, spinning the tresses of blonde hair around and around in a seemingly nervous habit which only resulted in strands coming loose and falling back in front of her face.

Larxene... was slightly put off. Not exactly disappointed, at least, not right at that point. But she worried she was headed right down that very road if things kept going at the rate they were, and the last place she wanted to end up on was at the end of a dead end street as the sun started rising, still without sex. Oh was a horrid existence _that_ would be. Nonetheless, something had somehow managed to pique her curiosity and she couldn't help but ask, "What's the project?"

Without another word, Naminé stood up from her seat on the couch, easily clambering over the piles of 'stuff' everywhere, making her way across the room to where a large sketchbook stood, nearly the size of Naminé's entire torso. Tucking this monstrous book under one arm and fishing around through an assortment of weird artistic goodies Larxene had no clue of how to use, Naminé returned to the couch moments later, sitting cross legged, the sketchbook laid out on her folded legs, three sticks of charcoal and a handful of pastels set atop of it.

"I was trying to draw a picture," Naminé said quietly.

"...Okay. So?" Narrowing her eyes, Larxene let out a small huff of a sigh, folding her arms. Alright, she knew it was childish. But come on already! What the hell was all this about? "Listen, I already tried to look at what you were drawing, but you wouldn't let me, remember? So whatever it is, you can just"

"Could I just try something?" Naminé asked, her voice taking on a pleading quality as she set a handful of charcoals and pastels up on the top corner of the sketchbook cover, setting it onto the coffee table.

"Try what? For crying out loud, Naminé, if you"

"Shh, you have to be quiet, okay?"

By that point, Larxene was convinced the other girl was off her rocker. Either that, or Larxene was just really dumb, because she honestly had no idea of what the hell was going on. But... Glancing at Naminé, Larxene stilled, noticing the small smile that Naminé gave her, the way she leant forward...

_HAH. I knew it!_

Inwardly, Larxene was grinning wildly and inwardly patting herself on the back while outwardly she slid her eyes closed and leaned in closer to the approaching warmth which was...

...Naminé's... hands?

With her eyes closed, Larxene could only feel the very slightest ghost of a touch from Naminé's fingertips as her hands gliding smoothly over Larxene's face. Palms passing over her cheeks, barely brushing against the soft fuzz there, leaving behind a radiating warmth. It fell somewhere between spring and summer, when the sun was just right and warmed the body to the core but not beyond that. It was the kind of touch, however light and hardly there, that made the receiver of it want to lean inwards towards it. It had to be more solid.

But as Naminé's fingers traveled over a smooth jaw, a small chin, and a pouty bottom lip, Larxene didn't move a single muscle. There was something, some weird, bizarre feeling, that let her know that Naminé was trying, trying very hard to work at fixing something. What that something was and what Naminé was trying to do? Hah, Larxene hadn't the slightest idea. But she did stay put, and for the moment, that is all that matters. The fact that one girl moved and the other girl didn't.

_"Naminé, do you believe it works? You read it in the books and you heard it on all the documentaries. You dreamed it in your head and you thought it through on paper. Do you really think it works? And if you do, how do you know what you know someone so entirely like that? How do you really capture their soul on paper, on canvas? Do you know? I want to know... If you know, or if you find out, you'll tell me, won't you? Won't you, Naminé?"_

Naminé nodded once, thought the movement was lost to Larxene, for at that moment Naminé drew her fingers over the other girl's eyes, allowing her own to close as all of her focus drew onto the simple act of feeling. Feeling, touching and trying to see so clearly that the sun would hurt. _That's why you close your eyes._

_"I heard that rabbits have to rely completely on their hearing and feeling senses when they're down there in those rabbit holes of theirs. That's what I heard, you know. Because they can't see or anything. They try and try, maybe, but it's underground and it's way, way too dark for them to see. Maybe if they were cats or something. But they're just rabbits and so they use their big ears to hear the earth around them and listen to what it tells them. And they use their whiskers to brush against the dirt as it surrounds them and shakes when there's danger and stills when it's calm. Rabbits are really smart like that, you know? They're very good at listening. Listening and feeling."_

With her eyes entirely shut then, Naminé threw herself completely into it. If 'it' was a ledge, she wouldn't have flown straight off, up into the air, maybe never to be seen or heard from again. Heard. Hearing. She could hear Larxene breathing, slow and steady. She could feel the muscles of the other girl moving in rhythm to the breathing which in turn moved with the heartbeat which in turn moved with the... It was a never-ending cycle, it seemed. Where one influence stopped, another began, and the entire body was linked all together.

Larxene's close eyelids were closed by muscles which were instructed to close by the brain. That instruction had traveled through so much space in the human body, all in a matter of split seconds...

Beneath the skin there flows the blood and in the blood there flows the oxygen. The blood is pumped through the heart, which, although it is no more than just a pumping, beating muscle, has come to symbolize human emotion in its very simplest form. _So... does it really hold anything? Or do things just filter through it, nothing sticking or staying... Is that the way you work, Larxene?_

The minutes drew on like that, Naminé's hands never straying from Larxene's face, their furthest travels only dipping down and around to the junction of jaw and neck, quickly sweeping back up the side of her face, past earlobes and only slightly grazing against the few strands of blonde hair that managed to fall across the path of her fingers.

By the time she had finished, Naminé could recall ever dip, every rise, fall, and curve of that one face, the muscles behind it, and the makings behind that, whatever they may have been. Emotion, intelligence, or just plain blood, it really didn't make a difference. Naminé opened her eyes.

"...They say... Leonardo DaVinci. That was something he did," Naminé said, enunciating each word precisely and slowly, choosing them carefully and running through them all once, twice in her head. "He would see people on the streets and he would want to draw them. And... he'd do that, you know. Because he wanted to... maybe get a feel for who the person was. How they acted. Because he couldn't help it."

Watching as Naminé lifted her charcoals and pastels into her hands, flipping to a blank page of the sketchbook, Larxene allowed her body to relax. Or at least... she tried to convince it to relax.

Larxene and Naminé locked eyes, and though one gaze wavered and one gaze refused to do so, there was some plane of equality between them. Neither knew why, neither knew how. Both were strong believers in the practice of things just happening and just being. Naminé just happened to do that action, Larxene just happened to not do this action, it just happened, happened, happened. And Larxene nodded once, trying to smother the smile that wanted so desperately to shine through.

_Why smile? I didn't get what I wanted. What was the purpose? Why should I be happy?_

But she undoubtedly was. And she couldn't figure out why. And this, more than anything else, bothered Larxene to no end.

x x x

_"I don't know if I really understand..."_

_"That's okay."_

_"It is?"_

_"...Tell me, Naminé. How long do you think you have?"_

_"...What do you mean?"_

_"When you're little, you know... it feels like you have forever. That life is just going to go on and on. It's never going to stop. If you're a happy child, your life is going to be happy forever, you're never going to cry, never going to be sad. If you're an unhappy child, the pain is going to go on. It's never going to stop. ...But in reality, the unhappy can end up smiling... the happy can end up crying... How long do you think you have before your childhood is gone?"_

_"...My childhood **is** gone. I'm almost twenty."_

_"...It's not gone. Just look."_

x x x

For just a moment, we're going to pause now. We're going to jump back a day and a handful of hours ago, to when Naminé and Yuffie still sat in the gray, eerie old kitchen. To the minutes just after Yuffie had heard the voice with the sound of bells and to the moments just after the celery stick had dropped out of her awestruck mouth. Remember now?

We're going to fast-forward through the seconds of shock and surprise to the moments in which Naminé explains everything.

Well... almost everything.

"I first came to Traverse Town thinking that it would be another dull and boring place. Just like all the others, right? There's only so much excitement one place can hold. Places that have heaps and gobs of excitement take off really fast, pulling in tourists and putting up apartment complexes. One right after another. Landfills, bridges, skyscrapers... before you know it an entire coastline of sand and tall grass can be mowed down into a concrete-and-metal urban jungle.

"So about the real estate agency...

"The last one went out of business. I mean, the last one I worked for. The guy who owned the place just took all the money one day and ran. No one knows where he went and the police couldn't really do much to track him down. He had no living relatives and none of us really knew if he'd even had any close friends. So there was nothing anyone could do and the entire place was just shut down. Just like that. All because of one guy's stupidity, everything went to shreds.

"I was one of the lucky ones. My parents footed the bill to pay for the move to Traverse Town and to get the tiny little hole in the wall I live it. The moment I got there, I was absolutely lost. I remember thinking that there was no way a real estate agency could ever make a living in such a dinky little place out in the middle of nowhere. But it turns out that I was pretty wrong.

"To make a long part of the story pretty short, I went in for a meeting with Mr. Highwind (who right away made me call him Cidit was pretty weird) and landed a new job. As a normal agent for the company, I didn't really make much. But I took it up with Cid a few weeks later and after a lot of mumbling, bumbling, and grumbling, he said he'd get me another job. A side job, I guess.

"And that was how I met...

"Okay, wait. I'm getting a little ahead of myself. Okay. Here we go again...

"_That_ was how I ended up taking care of the old mill down by the creek. It was a pretty run-down place and had been on the market for _ten whole years_ without a buyer. Well no wonder! The place was practically falling apart because Cid somehow had this absolutely brilliant idea of saving money by not investing in any sort of company to keep up the maintenance of the old place. So that's where I came in.

"Every other day, I'd swing by the old mill after work and do some cleaning. The place had originally been set up way back when and had done a pretty decent enough job for the small town around it. But with electricity becoming more and more useable, it eventually got remodeled into a house, put on the market, and bought up at a pretty fair price.

"But... something happened. I don't really know what. The whole deal is pretty shady. All that's really important is that I ended up taking care of this ancient piece of property, trying to fix it up enough to get it bought. Cid would've had it demolished, he'd said, but he really didn't want to go through with it. Even though he didn't really specify why he didn't want to tear the old place down, I'm willing to bet that Cid himself was pretty attached to the mill.

"What can I say? It was a cute little relic from some history long ago. The only link the tiny town had to its tiny past in its tiny little world that was just so isolated. So... I started looking into buying the house for myself. But even with all the bargains Cid's willing to give me... which isn't really all that much now that I think about it... I still won't have enough for another whole year. By then someone's sure to buy it... but... I really wanna live here, you know? But anyway...

"_That's_ when I met Cloud."

x x x

Irvine let out a dramatic huff of a sigh, finally hanging the very last white-collared, button-up shirt the cleaners had to give him. Nearby, Yuffie leant was perched on top of the washing machine, biting her nails and staring off into space. Her feet swung forward and backward, hitting the metal exterior of the washing machine with a rhythmic 'thud, thud, thud.'

Welcome to the land of overtime at the dry cleaners.

"Hey Yuffie," Irvine prompted, snapping the girl back into reality as she blinked rapidly before actually focusing on his face.

"Yeah?"

"I was wondering..." Irvine's voice started walking the hazy line between the audible and the inaudible as he went about hurriedly tidying up the assortment of bleaches, soaps, and softeners. "You're a girl... a thing or two... um, anatomy, right? I mean after all... what they like and everything..."

"...That made about as much sense as Mr. Tigi doing cartwheels down the hallway of a public school."

At this, Irvine perked up, a smirk forming as he quipped, "Hey, I heard he actually _did_ that you know."

"In a pair of gym shorts." Yuffie grinned then rolled her eyes. "Come on, what the hell was it you were **really** saying?"

In a flash, Irvine's cocky smirk was gone, replaced by a mask that tried so very hard to look certain and carefree, but was really quite... embarrassed?

"There's... well... Okay. See. There's this girl..."

"Ooooh, a giiiirl!"

"Shut up, Yuffie! She's important to me, okay? ...Her name's Selphie. And... you know. I was wondering if maybe you could give me some... ah... 'pointers' or... something. Maybe. Since you're a girl and all... I mean, it's really weird. ...Just..."

"Wait, so..." Yuffie's eyes widened in absolute amazement, her mouth dropping open as she gaped at Irvine before exclaiming, "You want me to give you sex advice!"

"_SHHH!_" Irvine rapidly glanced left and right, double-checking to make sure there was absolutely no one there to overhear the entire conversation. Granted, they were in a dry cleaners. After closing time. And after the manager had gone home. The likelihood that there would be someone lurking in the shadows here was pretty... well... unlikely. But still. That's what they'd thought about that corduroy bear and just look what happened with that.

Irritably, Irvine continued, "Look, you're a girl. Don't you know what girls... you know... _like_ and everything?"

"Why would I know **that**!"

"Would you keep it down! Yuffie... I'm serious."

"Wow. So... this Selphie chick must be something pretty special for _you_ to be serious."

"...I'll let that one slide if you'll just help me out."

"Okay. Whaddya wanna know?"

"Just..." Irvine fought for words, thoughts... anything that would give him some footing in what he was trying to figure out. To Yuffie, it looked like he was trying to climb a giant mountain made of ice cream. The way was cold, slippery, and full of sugar, and if you fell through it, you'd get a brain freeze.

...Okay. Maybe it wasn't exactly like climbing a mountain of ice cream. But it's all about the metaphor. Sex talk about female anatomy equals giant treacherous mountain of ice cream.

Finally, he spat out the words. "Whatmakesgirlshorny!"

"...How should I know?"

"Yuffiiiie... Come on."

Leaping off of the washing machine, Yuffie balled both her petite hands into fists, whacking Irvine's shoulder with both of them. Those hands may very well have been 'petite,' but there was no doubt about it. Yuffie was capable of packing a really nasty punch.

"Oww! What the hell was that for!"

"Get real, Irvine. I'm not a pervert, I don't masturbate, I don't fantasize, I don't sleep around, and I **don't** ask other girls what turns them on, got it!"

"I never said!"

"Just lay off! Why don't you go ask a... a... a big stupid dyke for help, okay!" Turning sharply on her heel, Yuffie stormed towards the front of the store, grabbing her coat and ramming her arms through the sleeves, ignoring the sound of Irvine's footsteps running down the narrow room of the dry cleaners as he tried to catch up. But by the time he'd made it to the front desk, the door was already on its way shut, bells jingling merrily despite the suddenly hostile atmosphere hanging in the air.

Irvine frowned, then let out another deep sigh. The second in five minutes. It had to be a record or something for him. Turning back to finish his job, Irvine quietly mumbled, "Sheesh, if you didn't want to talk about it, you could've just said so."

Meanwhile, Yuffie was speed-walking down the street. Her car? She should've driven it. _I've finally got my stupid license back... Why don't I feel like driving? _It took Yuffie two whole blocks before she finally slowed down her breakneck pace and drew to a slower, steady walk. Why had she completely blown up back there? What was it that had set her off? Even Yuffie couldn't start to figure it out...

Another thing Yuffie couldn't figure out?

It started twenty minutes after her abrupt departure from the cleaners. It started as she entered her apartment and flipped the light-switch. It started as she stood in the middle of her kitchen, hands hanging numbly at her sides, eyes sliding carelessly over the room... well... it started when she realized that she was very alone.

So how did what start? What even started in the first place?

Well. It all really started with the phonebook. Still wrapped in its plastic bag from its delivery earlier that day, the phonebook sat on the counter, peering up at Yuffie curiously. _So what do you think, Yuffie? So what do you want to do now, mm?_

What she did was sit down at the tiny kitchen table on a rickety old stool. Hauling the phonebook onto the table, she ripped open the bag, tossed it to the side, and stared the phonebook down, almost as though she were trying to melt it with her eyes. After discovering that she was indeed no X-Man, woman, or otherwise, Yuffie gave up. She drummed her fingers against the table. She eyed the phonebook. She crossed and uncrossed her eyes, hummed a few notes of some song. Eyed the phonebook.

...And Yuffie began to flip through the

x x x

pages.

Kairi shook her head. _No_, ripping out every last one of the pages of her magazine was _not_ the solution to her problem. What she needed was music. Peppy music that would lift her mood, brighten her spirits, and pull her out of whatever slump she'd sunk into in the first place.

Having long since migrated from Larxene's room to her own futon on the floor of the living room, Kairi simply rolled over towards the small stereo set up in the corner. The poor thing was neglected, she noticed, a thin layer of dust covering the entire setup. Well no wonder. If Larxene lived the life she seemed to, she wasn't going to be around much to use her stereo. _That's just a rotten shame._

A few buttons pressed, a CD wrestled out of Kairi's duffle bag and popped into the player and there she had it. Her peppy love song for the day. ...Somehow though, it depressed her more than it cheered her up. _Man, what's wrong with me today?_

And just as she was grudgingly about to turn back to her magazine, a very strange thing happened.

The phone rang.

_'...I'll be the fire escape that's bolted to the ancient brick where you will sit and contemplate your fate...' _sang the stereo speakers.

Of course, for the sake of the story, Kairi had long since forgotten one of the Three Golden Rules Larxene had previously established. It wasn't that she meant to. Really, it wasn't even entirely her fault. Later, she would blame the magazine for having liquefied her brain so. But at that moment, all she was thinking fell into the simple sequence of: phone ring, close magazine, answer now.

"Hello?"

"..." Silence. Clearly.

"Hellooo?" And of course, for the sake of the story, it was at that moment that Kairi remembered that one particular little rule. Clapping a hand over her mouth, she squeaked out a muffled, "Ohshit!" and hurriedly made to hang up the stupid phone as fast as possible. But it was one particular voice that chirped through the phone that kept her on it just a little longer, much to her own horror.

"Kairi?"

"Wha?"

"Um... hi."

"Um, um, um, um... **HELLO**!" she exclaimed, nervous as all hell and eager to just hang up and be done with it. _What if Larxene finds out? What would she do, would she kick me out? She'd be upset, no doubt and..._

_'...I'll be the water wings that save you if you start drowning in an open tap when your judgement's on the brink...'_

"...Ah... I was just ah... calling to uh... see if the um... the er... the phonebook... uh... worked."

"...The weh?" was Kairi's intelligent response.

"The ah... the phonebook." The person on the other end of the line cleared her through and tried to clarify, though with a considerable amount of difficulty. "You know, cause uh... we um... got new phonebooks. ...Today."

Kairi blinked. Was there an echo going on, or was it just her? She glanced back behind her towards the stereo... no, it still seemed to be playing normally. Taking the momentary pause in the conversation to her advantage, Kairi experimentally covered up the earpiece of the phone. The echo was gone. She removed her hand. The echo was back. Aha.

"...Who is this?"

"It's Yuffie for crying out!"

"...Hey, what music are you playing over there?"

_'...I'll be the phonograph that plays your favorite albums back as you're lying there_

_drifting__ off to sleep...'_

"...Heh. Um... I guess..."

"Yeah..."

"So, the phonebook?"

"...Oh, yeah! Well, you know, sometimes they print the numbers wrong and everything. ...In the phonebook, I mean."

"Yeah, I got it."

"So I was just like... calling to see if it was right. And it is."

"They pay you to do this?"

"No. But they should, dammit."

_'...I'll be the platform shoes, undo what heredity's done to you; you won't have to strain_

_to__ look into my eyes...'_

"'I'll be your winter coat buttons zipped straight to the throat with the collar up, so you won't catch cold.'" Kairi grinned. She couldn't control it. Yuffie couldn't see it, but Kairi couldn't control it. What could she say? It was one hell of a coincidence after all.

As if things weren't already weird enough. Their shaky conversation continued like that for another few moments before both yawned (at the same time?) and decided to call it a night. Yuffie hung up the phone a moment later, her mind in some sort of numb state that falls somewhere before absolute horror and shock sets in. And like an omen, good, bad, or who-knows-what, the last phrase of the song played through once more before cutting off at the end.

_'...Everything will change.'_

(x) (x) (x)

Okay, sorry you guys didn't get to meet Cloud this chapter. I was going to plug that scene in instead of the little Naminé background story, but I figured that it was more beneficial to you as a reader. XD Besides, it gives you something to look forward to in the next chapter. ...Which is already partially written. ...Partially. Oh. And I forgot who sang the song used. It's a very good song, though. XO I'll find the name and give credit for it in the next chapter.

_Preview for the next chapter:_ Yuffie, in a desperate attempt to prove her sanity, gathers together the Fantastic Four and makes for Naminé's quiet little sanctuary in the woods. What will they find? What will Naminé cook? And when a certain little owner of a bell-like voice gets loose, what new words will he learn? ...And finally, will Mr. Tigi ever act like a normal human being?


	5. Butterflies and Fireflies

**My Oh My**

'Butterflies and Fireflies'

It was around two-thirty in the afternoon when Kairi showed up at Sora and Riku's condo. Riku opened the door, toothbrush dangling out of the corner of his mouth, towel wrapped around his waist. Why it seemed he always had his shirt off in front of everyone, Kairi would never know. But at that particular moment, that was the last thing on her mind.

Shuffling into the condo, she waggled her hands in some sort of motion, moving her mouth to form some sort of words, her eyes half-closed into some sort of sleepy expression.

"Riku. Back."

Blinking, Riku pulled the toothbrush from his mouth and wagged it admonishingly under Kairi's nose, though careful not to paint his long-time friend with toothpaste and saliva as he said, "...You know, if you slept on a _real_ bed, you might not have this problem."

"Back. Oww."

"Fine."

In what appeared to be the friendliest of gestures, Kairi wrapped her arms around Riku's neck, Riku wrapped his arms around Kairi's back, and...

_Crrrraaaack_

"OWW!"

Rolling his eyes, Riku scrunched his eyebrows together and blew a few tickling strands of Kairi's hair out of his face. "I _told_ you, the futon isn't really..."

_Snapcrackcrack_

"RIKKKUUUUUU! Are you trying to break my freaking- "

_Crunch._

"...Mm..." Kairi slumped forward, Riku sagged under the weight, Sora walked into the room... and proceeded to burst into a fit of giggles.

"Kairi needed her back cracked again?"

"Yes," croaked Riku, flailing his arms around and trying to heave the girl off of him.

"Hehehe... I feel much better now." Shooting Riku a grin, Kairi stretched, yawned, and shrugged her shoulders up and down as if checking the quality of the job Riku had done. Head bent to the left, head bent to the right, turn left, turn right, up, down, rotate shoulders in sockets, reach down and touch the floor, twist the spinal cord gently to the left, gently to the right, both hands on hips and press inward and...

"Thanks Riku!" Kairi chirped, closing the condo door behind her.

Sora glanced at Riku. Riku glanced at Sora.

"...Don't you feel kinda... used?" questioned Sora.

"Yep," answered Riku.

And we all know what they proceeded to do after that.

x x x

Kairi slipped into the apartment, closing the door behind her with a quiet click. It was true; her back _had_ been driving her crazy. But her main problem was just that she thought something was wrong... with _Larxene_. So what exactly was Kairi's reasoning behind this assumption? Well it was all very simple.

In the morning Larxene hadn't had a cup of coffee. She hadn't talked about her mysterious visit with Naminé the other day. She hadn't even called Kairi 'Pooh.' It'd been a humdrum procession of wake up, shower, dress, and head to work, no ifs ands or buts about it. And quite frankly, it puzzled all hell out of Kairi.

That was why Kairi knew, from the very moment she set foot in the apartment, that something was strange. No Larxene draped over a sofa and surrounded by her trusty alcoholic beverages. No music, no notes, no coat on the ground, no purse on the floor. And yet still, the apartment felt like someone was in it. Someone other than Kairi. Some one, two, and now three.

_Somewhatwhatwhat_

"Nnn... no, keep going..."

_Creak. _

"Hah...hah... wait..."

_Creeeak__, creak..._

Hmm. Those sounds were familiar.

And have you ever wondered how your body sometimes runs on autopilot at the most inconvenient of times? Seems random and stupid, but hold up a moment. You've been walking through your house or down the hallway, your mind is off and you have no idea where you're going. But you're _feet_ do. They've been there before, the muscles have memorized the movements and they're going through the motions because the muscles (though certainly not having an independent mind all their own) know for a **fact** where you want to go.

And yet sometimes even muscles are wrong.

Sometimes you end up bumbling into the boys' bathroom while wandering around in a half-asleep stupor.

Sometimes you end up walking into a telephone pole you could've sworn wasn't there the day before.

Sometimes... shit happens.

And shit was exactly what happened to Kairi as she found her muscles following the sounds like well-trained bloodhounds (only following the ears rather than the nose, I suppose), her mind completely paralyzed with the horrible, irrepressible realization that _'Christ, Larxene is screwing someone and I'm about to walk in on her. I'm about to walk in or her and she's screwing someone. Larxene is about to be walked in on by me while she's screwing someone. While Larxene is screwing someone...'_

Yep. That would be why Kairi was unable to yell to her feet, "No, you fools! Stop! Stay back! No, dammit!" Instead, she found herself standing there in the open doorway of Larxene's bedroom, mouth hanging wide open as she surveyed the scene before her.

Thankfully, Kairi hadn't made a stop for fat free frozen yogurt on the way back. If she'd done that... well... Let's just say she would've come back right in the middle of-

"**JESUS KAIRI, WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE**!"

_Shit._

Larxene shoved upwards on the man hovering above her, who only moments ago had been pinning her to the bed, working his way down the buttons of her shirt. Now he was sprawled on the floor, cursing like a sailor and shooting Larxene a look that could've been equivocated to thousands upon thousands off wee little wasps. With whips and chains and all sorts of other kinky things.

"_Get OUT!_" Larxene shouted again, struggling to pull both her shirt and herself together as she swung her legs over the side of the bed, stepping on the man she'd thrown there only moments ago. And in a flash, Kairi was doing just as she'd asked. ...Or at least... she was trying. She was trying very hard.

_Crash! BANG!_

Kairi stubbed her toe. "_Ahh_"

Kairi slammed the back of her head against the doorframe. "_Shit!_"

Kairi rammed her hip against the doorknob. "_Ohmigod_"

And Kairi was on the floor, scrambling backwards, feeling bruised, confused, and really, really darn bad.

"What the _fuck_ do you think you're doing! I fucking **told** you not to come in here, didn't I? Why the _hell_ are you here? What do you think you're _doing_!"

"Whoa, cool it Larxene. She could've _joined_ us, yanno. You didn't have to go totally-"

"OUT! NOW!"

"What! But what the-"

"Axel, if you don't get the fuck **out** of my apartment, I'm calling the goddamn police and they'll tote your sorry ass into **jail**! **GET OUT**!"

'Axel' didn't take kindly to this. On his way out the door, he just happened to step on Kairi's fingers, shooting her a dirty glare which clearly said, 'Burn in hell.' With a slam of the apartment door, the fiery lover (if you could even really call him that) was quite gone. And the apartment was quite silent. Larxene stood in the center of her bedroom, hands clutching her shirt closed, oblivious to the fact that Axel had managed to get both the button and the fly of her jeans undone and he'd clearly not bothered to put it all back together before his departure.

No, all Larxene could think about was...

_Oh man, she's gonna kill me,_ Kairi thought. Her body was already attempting to do her in, apparently. Sure. Why not. Go ahead. Why not just add Larxene into the mixture after all, right? ...But that wasn't how it happened. Because at that moment, Kairi burst into tears.

"Aww, Larxene! I'm sorry, I'm _sorry_! I di... I di... I didn't mean to... I just c-c-came in and there were _noises_ and I dunno... I dunno what I was thinking I was..." Kairi was losing it, that's what she was doing. And she rattled off apologies like nobody's business and she couldn't understand a word she was saying and her head, hip, and toe hurt and she had to keep her eyes shut because she couldn't stand seeing Larxene like that and she had to... and she was... and she and she and she...

And she listened as Larxene's footsteps strode across the floor of her bedroom.

And she listened to the other girl's curses and swears as fabric rustled and closet doors opened.

And she listened as the footsteps came closer.

And she listened as she continued to beg for forgiveness for something she hadn't even been aware of doing.

And she was nearly kicked aside as Larxene shoved past her on her way out the apartment door.

Kairi sat there. She shut up. She winced at the slam of the door and she winced as the corner of the doorframe ate into the flesh on her back. And she listened. As the apartment grew still and silent as she felt like she'd gone and done something horribly wrong. And, and, and, is all it was.

_And I feel like such a child for not knowing any better._

x x x

"These windows all around me, yes these windows who keep telling me..." Leon hated working overtime at The Emporium. But what he hated even more was not knowing why he was working overtime and not knowing why no one else was there to do so with him. Not that he wanted company or antyhing... "To rid my dirty mind of all of its preciousness."

He liked singing when he was alone, too.

Kind of like how he secretly enjoyed picking flowers. How he was sometimes still drawn to chemistry websites and textbooks, even though he could never manage to understand quite why. That life was over and done with.

"Where is my master rebel..."

Ant then there came The Sound.

"...Hello?"

_Click._

"Larxene, get lost. Your shift's over."

_Clickity__, click, shhk._

"Unless you want to stay and lock up." Leon was getting rather disturbed, though he would never admit it. His voice took on a wary tone as he nervously called out into the apparently empty store, "Larxene?"

_Flick, flick, flutter, ffft._

"...Ah..."

"Hey there!"

The voice did not come from a boisterous twenty-two year old girl. The voice did not come from a customer either. Rather, it came from... a very... little... person.

He was dressed in some rather crazy looking garb, light blues, dark blues, greens and yellows, oranges and purples, all jumbled together in threads and fibers woven into a little vest, shirt, and pants. The shirt was too big, the pants were too tight, and the vest was somewhat lopsided, but somehow it had an almost endearing quality to it, multicolored beads sewn on sloppily in place of buttons. More were threaded around his neck in some strange fashion of a necklace and the blonde gravity-defying spikes of hair completely threw Leon through a loop.

What.

On.  
Earth.

"..." There were not words to describe the thoughts that flickered through Leon's mind at that particular moment in time. But let me give you a vague idea of the feeling. Certainly you have heard of the condition of having 'butterflies in your stomach'? Yes? Well. Now imagine those stomach-butterflies for me. Imagine them the size of a ten-story building with razor sharp fangs dripping blood, buggy eyes that are roughly proportional to a house (only in spherical form, of course), and holding Marilyn Monroe in one gangly insect-arm while sucking on your **brain**.

Having imagined these butterflies, I'm certain you all now have a slightly better feel for just what Leon was going through. Splendid.

"...Are you Larxene's friend? Does she work here?" the little monster asked, clearly not the slightest bit put-off by Leon's quietness. Instead, he seemed quite content to just prattle on by himself, all the while perched just at the tip of Leon's nose, tiny harms hugging the structure in order to keep himself in place on Leon's face as he continued to talk. "She's not here, you know. She's back where I came from!"

"I always _knew_ she was a demon."

"Huh?"

"...Um. Nevermind."

Frankly, Leon was shocked that he'd even spoken in the first place. After all, he was talking to himself. ...Wasn't he? There was certainly no way that a little tiny man was at that moment hugging his nose and talking to him, all the while dressed in what appeared to be a reject of a Halloween costume from the sixties? ...Whoa. Wait a moment. Leon had to slow down. He had to take deep breaths. He had to...

"You have really pretty eyes," the little thing randomly noted, leaning closer towards Leon with the words, nearly splaying his entire tiny torso right against the bridge of Leon's nose. Alright then. That did it. _Enough with my sanity_, Leon figured.

"Who-- What are you!"

Rather than answering, the little fellow slipped from Leon's face to his shoulder, where he proceeded to bury his face in the soft choppy locks that hung just down to there. "...And hair!"

"Ow! Get off!"

"I'm sorry! It just looked so pullable so I had to pull it!" The sad thing? The little monster really did sound like he was truly sorry, from the very bottom of his mouse-sized heart. Big blue eyes (well, big only in proportion to his thimble-sized head) blinked innocently up at Leon, shocks of blonde hair sticking straight up out of his head, to the left, to the right, falling around his face in the most messy and bizarre hairstyle Leon had ever set eyes on. And so there was only one thing he could say to all of it.

"I've lost my mind."

"Not quite." Shooting Leon a flash of a grin, the little man, folded his arms and drifted back up towards Leon's face with several flicks of those weird wings of his. Once there, he proceeded to use Leon's bottom lip as a kind of perch, tiny lit feet standing on the pout of his mouth while he leaned against Leon's nose, various bangles and beads he was dressed in brushing just across Leon's skin in a nearly unbearable tickle. "My name's Cloud, what's yours?"

And Leon had yet to even take in the wings. The wings of the creature. Oh yes indeed, he did have wings, for he could drift and he could float. And he was precisely what brought the Monroe-napping, brain-sucking butterflies to mind. For there, squarely planted on the back of this happy little fellow, were two broad butterfly wings, slowly opening and closing, as if moving in sync with the shallow breath of their owner. Truly, they were magnificent things, despite their size. Flecks of blue and yellow darted across their surface, the hint of texture so small and so light that Leon could've sworn the wings were made of nothing but the finest silk, richly pattered and brightly colored.

But... he'd been asked a question... hadn't he?

"...Nn..."

Cloud blinked again, wondering if 'Nn' actually meant anything or not. He would've asked too, or perhaps prompted further, but he found the answer he was looking for right before him, seated upon the check-out counter. Leon's wallet. Open to reveal his driver's license. "So your name's Leon. Hello, Leon."

"..."

Once again unfazed by a lack of response, Cloud rested his bitty little elbows on the tip of Leon's nose, spending a moment simply admiring his surroundings. As his eyes came to rest on the faint scar streaking across Leon's face, Cloud's eyebrows raised and he extended one small hand, tracing the scar from the bridge of Leon's nose to his cheek and softly asking, "What happened here?"

The action itself was something Leon was completely unprepared for. And just as he was completely unprepared for it, Cloud was completely unprepared for Leon's reflexive _re_action. For the next thing he knew, he had been flicked (yes, flicked) clean off Leon's face and was shooting across through the air, a tiny yelp torn from his mouth before his rather ungraceful landing. ...One would tend to think that as an animal of flight, Cloud would know how to land gracefully and without trouble. ...Well, if indeed that was the case, than one would be very, very wrong on a very, very regular basis.

"...Oh my." Leon seemed to be unable to do anything but stare as Cloud landed in a burst of sqeaks, right smack dab in a large carton of condoms. Of course. Where else would he have landed? But coming to his senses... mostly... Leon crept cautiously over towards the bin and peered in, trying to find a shock of blonde hair amidst the various other things in there. "...Um... I'm sorry. Did... Did I kill you?"

"Yes," came the choked response from somewhere amidst the stacks of individually wrapped latex accoutrements.

"Oh. I'm sorry."

"Ow."

"Are you okay?"

"No! I'm **dead**, you... you..." Seemingly at an utter loss for words, Cloud let out a tiny sigh and hung his head in defeat, pausing his momentary argument to ask, "What's a bad word?"

"What?'

"If you were going to insult someone, what would you call them?"

"...Um. I don't really make it my business to insult people. Everyone else says things like..." Leon paused for a moment, running through his mental filing cabinet before counting off on his fingers as the words floated to the surface, "Idiot, asshole, dip shit, dumb fuck, or more commonly, the phrase 'you're so gay.'"

"...I see." Cloud nodded several times in affirmation, his tiny little brows furrowed deep in concentration as he tapped his index finger against his left temple. It was sort of like he was trying to memorize the words by tapping them into his skull through Morse-code. "You're so gay, Leon," Cloud then stated simply.

Leon blinked.

_Insightful little bastard, isn't he?_

"...I think you need to explain yourself. Because either you're a very neurotic little bug that needs squashing, or I'm a very neurotic human that needs medication."

"Mm..." Cloud thought the prospect of both fates through seriously, once again tapping on the side of his head before smiling and nodding like a mini bobble-head doll. "Okay."

x x x

Naminé had pulled herself together by devoting her spare time to drawing. Her brief sketch of Larxene lay on a torn out page of her sketchbook, pinned to a drawing board, propped against the wall. Each and every morning on her way out the door, her eyes couldn't help but graze over its surface, dwindle on the marks and the lines, the contour, the empty space. It needed to be finished, but there was something that wasn't there, that _couldn't_ be there. Not then. And Naminé couldn't figure out what it was. _What am I missing?_

Meanwhile, Yuffie had been wasting away her valuable time by working overtime at the cleaners. This resulted in her learning more about her employer than she ever wanted to know. While a long list could be made of the disturbing things she discovered, I'll give you a quick recap to make your life slightly easier. For example, one morning while walking in before the cleaners' opening, Yuffie was startled to hear a peculiar sound coming from the back of the store. Somehow, her mind leapt to the conclusion of 'Robbers!' before she knew what hit her.

And somehow, that very conclusion suddenly had her stopped in her tracks, blinking at the floor. _Robbers, robbers, thieves and robbers. I've been stopped in my tracks and there are robbers. Noise from the back room... is this__ deja vu or am I still going crazy? _But at that moment, none other than Mr. Tigi burst through a curtain of clothes, mouth wide open as the lyrics of none other than Frank Sinatra's finest spilling from his mouth.

It wasn't cart-wheeling down a hallway in gym shorts. But it was singing 'Come Fly With Me' with a Chinese accent, a wooden spoon in hand, and clad in a bathrobe. And it was something that Yuffie would never forget for the rest of her life, even as she bumbled further into the cleaners, mumbling something that sounded an awful lot like an 'excuse me.' Mr. Tigi nodded happily as Yuffie made her way past him, calling out behind her, "You like Mr. Sinatra, Miss Yuffie?"

To this, Yuffie couldn't help but pause and blink, warily glancing over her shoulder and nodding slowly. "Yeah... I guess he's okay."

This seemed to greatly please Mr. Tigi, for his chest puffed up quite a considerable amount and a wide grin made itself present on his face as he said, "Ahh! He is the best, you know, Miss Yuffie. The best of the best, there is no other like him. When I was little, you see, I wanted so greatly to be like Mr. Sinatra, you see. I would buy all of his records, memorize all of his lyrics, Miss Yuffie! **That** is how devoted I was!"

Well, Yuffie just couldn't help herself. She had to ask him. Partly because some distant half of herself believed it was the courteous thing to do, but mostly because the more tangible half of herself just wanted to know what the hell the guy was talking about. "So... what happened? You sang at nightclubs or something?"

At this, Mr. Tigi let out a deep chuckle, throwing back his head as he did so and clapping his hands together delightedly before returning to his senses, shaking his head, and simply responding, "Why no, Miss Yuffie. No, no, no, never was I good enough, you see. Mr. Sinatra, you see... he is... he was..." As Mr. Tigi puzzled over the correct words, he ran his slightly pudgy fingers through his thinning hair before nodding again and continuing, "He was the _best_, Miss Yuffie. I try, I try, I try very hard, you see, but I never be good enough, you see. I never be good enough."

This not only struck Yuffie as surprisingly sad, but it was also surprisingly confusing, for Mr. Tigi refused to speak another word of the issue and instead changed into his proper business attire before heading to the front of the store to man the desk. That small, short snippet of conversation would hang over Yuffie's head for the remainder of that day, and the following days as well.

x x x

Somehow there are things that happen by chance. Perhaps they're not so farfetched as to be capable of being referred to as a part of fate or destiny, but perhaps they're nonetheless a very significant (albeit a very small) part of the intricate web of the human life. Larxene had known this. She had known this for a very long time. Naminé had known this. She had known this for an even longer time, for though no one would ever be brave enough to admit it, Naminé had a certain sense that Larxene did not.

And while Larxene sat beside her on the bench, Naminé knew that Kairi was back at the apartment, sick with worry, sick with guilt. She knew that Larxene was being selfish and ridiculous. She knew that Larxene was explaining poorly and hiding something. And yet she knew that pointing out these flaws and these inadequacies would solve absolutely nothing. That was the sense Naminé had. That was the sense Larxene so desperately wanted to tap into as they sat side by side on a rusty old bench in Shriner's Park.

Lonely engines of some cars, trucks, or whatever screaming through the town, just across the only and only highway that fell anywhere nearby. With the approaching darkness, the world almost shrank, growing smaller and smaller by the minute, by the second. And oh with all the shrinking, where on earth can you really run before there's nowhere left to go?

"You can't force yourself to be anything greater than you're meant to be, yanno?" Larxene prompted, elbows resting on her knees, jacket pulled taut across her shoulders as she leaned forward, fingers lacing together as she tried so hard to think and sort and figure it all out.

But Naminé just shook her head and quietly said, "I don't believe you."

"Well why the hell not?"

"...Do you really believe it yourself, Larxene? Come on now, you can't believe, deep, _deep _down at the bottom of your heart... that this was what you always wanted to do with your life..? When you were little, you had dreams. We all have dreams when we're little..." Naminé trailed off, her voice sounding distant, her gaze being pulled away by the setting sun and the rising moon and the realization that everything was not, in fact, perfectly okay.

It's a disturbing realization, let me tell you.

"Yeah," Larxene bit back, mouth puckering into a frown as she said sarcastically, "When I was a kid, I had _great_ dreams."

"Like what?"

"...I wanted to be a rock star."

"...Really?"

"Yeah. Pretty dumb, huh?"

"No. It's not dumb."

"...Well. Seems dumb **now**."

"How can being a rock star look dumb from where's _you're_ sitting?" Naminé asked, turning to look at her friend, a frown now drawing itself across her own face as she responded with, "You're sitting on an old park bench in the middle of some go-nowhere town. You're sitting in Shriner's Park, Larxene, and you have _no idea_ what on earth you've done and you have no idea what on earth you're going to do."

"Stop acting like you know me, brat."

"..." Naminé swung her legs back and forth, stretching them out in front of her so it looked like she was closely examining her shoes in the fading light. In reality, she was actually trying to figure out whether or not she really wanted to press the issue any further. Clearly, she chose to do so, seeing as her next words were, "Maybe you're just upset because I might just know you better than you know yourself."

She'd braced herself for the wrath of Larxene in its full, unbridled swarm of anger and frustration. But all she got was what was left in the other girl, the dregs of guilt and scraps of self-pity.

"Yeah. Well. Fuck you if you're right."

"...I thought you weren't going to-"

"I'm _sorry_, okay? Forget it."

"...Okay."

The two continued to sit side by side for some time. Neither knew how long, really. The sun was gone and the stars were one by one blinking into view, the time for wishing on the very first long since gone before either one of them finally spoke up again.

"I do bad things. You know... crap no one knows about. Because if they _knew_ about it, they wouldn't even want to know me anymore."

"That's not true."

"Wanna bet?"

Naminé said nothing.

"So how 'bout if I told you... What would you do if I said I'd robbed a bank?"

"I wouldn't hate you for that."

"What if I ran over a dog?"

"It wasn't like it was your fault."

"What if I did it on purpose?"  
"I still wouldn't hate you."

Larxene stayed silent a moment, seeming to debate back and forth with herself inside her head.

"So what if I killed someone?"

The park was quiet, but the fireflies were out. Naminé cocked her head to the side and stayed silent for a moment.

"Sometimes things happen, Larxene. It's like growing up. Things happen because they do and because there's nothing we can do to stop them. In this life or any other it could have happened. If not now than later."

A firefly looped in drunken circles towards the pair, visible in short bursts of light, hovering and twirling, dancing and spinning in midair. Hypnotizing in such a simple way it could've been call primitive, but it didn't quite reach back that far. One would never call ballroom dancing primitive, would they?

After a moment of silence, Naminé added to clarify, "No, I wouldn't hate you for that."

Larxene...

Couldn't figure it out. She just couldn't possibly manage to understand someone like that and it really _bothered_ her. Bothered wasn't the right word, but she couldn't place her finger on a better one. How could Naminé possibly hold such feeling towards her that she wouldn't hate her for something so horrible? There was nothing between them- hardly even friendship, right?

_"Sometimes there are things that aren't really classified as friendship and aren't really classified as romance. Sometimes there are things on the in-between and the outside. Sometimes there are, but sometimes there aren't. Don't you think those are the most important things, Naminé? The things we can't define or describe? Aren't those still somehow the things you hold closest to your heart? ...They are for me."_

Larxene stood up from the park bench and Naminé figured that was that and the other girl would be gone with a scuff of her shoes and a flip of hair. But instead, she was most surprised to find Larxene suddenly standing in front of her, though her back was towards her. Crouching down, the other girl muttered, "Hey. Hop on."

"...Huh?"

"Don't make me _stand_ here all _day_, Pie. You know how a piggy-back ride works. Just get on already or I'll leave you behind and you can just forget about it."

_Pie?_

Well she didn't mean to, but Naminé giggled anyway as she wrapped her arms around Larxene's neck and was lifted clear off the ground. Larxene really was considerably taller than her. Hooking her arms around Naminé's legs, Larxene couldn't help but wonder, _When was the last time I ever did anything this weird?_ And she couldn't give herself an answer. And somehow, she didn't really care for one all that much anyway.

The two plodded along through the park, and though Larxene wasn't sure where she was going, Naminé seemed to be in no greater hurry to get home than she herself was. In fact, Naminé ended up resting her chin on Larxene's shoulder, her eyes dropping shut as the first drops of rain began to fall from the sky.

Did either of them honestly care?

More importantly, did you really think they even would?

"...Thanks, Larxene."

"Whatever. Just be glad I'm big and strong, got it?"

"Mmhm. I'm glad."

"Fucking **good**."

"Larxene..."

"Oh for _crying_ out loud!"

The rain grew stronger, Naminé fell asleep, but Larxene didn't mind either, because Naminé's tiny little body kept her warm and dry.

..._You and me in Shriner's Park. Trying to make some sense._

x x x

"So let me see if I've got this right. ...You're a... faerie."

"Yep."

"And your name is Cloud."

"Uh huh."

"And you decided to come home with me because..?"

"It's a long story." Cloud nodded emphatically, clasping his hands together and resting his chin on them. After a moment of sitting like this, Cloud grinned and confessed, "...Okay, so it's not really. I need your help Leon." The two of them sat in the kitchen of Leon's small and sparsely furnished home, Cloud perched on a pin cushion he'd dubbed as his sofa and Leon perched on a stool, staring blearily at the little blonde boy on his table as Cloud continued. "Just like you need my help. We can help each other, you know. And Naminé, Yuffie, Kairi, Larxene... we can help them too."

For the first time ever, Cloud actually seemed affected by the blank stare he received from Leon in return.

"...Um... Maybe I should explain. Even though it's not a long story, it still might take a while. Is that okay?"

"I see." Leon seemed to seriously think about it for a moment before nodding once, veeery slowly, and rising to his feet. "I think I need a gin and tonic." As he headed towards the liquor cabinet, he heard a chirped agreement from Cloud, who then started merrily whistling an oldies song with a swingy sound and an upbeat tune. He turned around momentarily.

Cloud waved cheerfully at his host.

Leon turned back around and shook his head.

"...Nevermind. Just the gin'll do."

x x x

It was eleven o'clock when the phone rang.

Kairi... was reasonably drunk by then.

She would later claim that it wasn't her fault. That she was distressed because Larxene hadn't come home and it'd been nearly five hours. That she hadn't heard from the other girl or anyone else, for that matter. That she was lonely, worried, and feeling guiltier than she'd ever felt in her life. And that Larxene had offered her the alcohol earlier anyway, right? Right. Exactly. Precisely. That was what Kairi would say later. And Larxene wouldn't mind. She'd get quite a kick out of it, actually.

But right then, Kairi didn't say a thing.

How many things have I messed up today? Let's see... I probably walked in on Sora and Riku about to have sex. I did walk in on Larxene and what's-his-face about to have sex. I pissed Larxene off and made her run away. And now I've raided her wine coolers. Damn but those things are tasty. What's left for me to mess up?

Ah yes, that phone ring there.

Kairi somehow managed to shove herself away from the island counter in the little kitchenette and scoot her stool several feet over towards the phone. Granted, she whacked her head against the wall in the process (don't ask how), but she could hardly feel a thing anyway, so ultimately, it didn't really matter all that much.

"Hello?"

"...Um... Kairi?" It was Yuffie. ...Who else would it have been?

"...Mmmmhmmm. That's me."

"...Are you okay?"

"Peachy. Peach flavored, in fact. Like ah... that bottle there." Kairi squinted at one of the various bottles littering the countertop. She was pretty sure it was peach flavored. She wasn't exactly sure though. By then she'd had about six too many drinks. She wasn't at the top of her game, you know. But that's been stated and explained before.

"You sound kinda... um... drunk."

"Naaah."

"Are you sure?"

"Mm... no."

"Oh. ...Where's Larxene?"

"Dunno. Kinda worried. Walked in on sex. Lots of anger."

On the other end of the line, Yuffie was getting a bit freaked out. Why couldn't Kairi be a happy drunk like most people? (Actually, she'd only met several happy drunks in her entire life. But they were very pleasant people, really, and Yuffie couldn't wait to meet more of them. ...But she wasn't really thinking of that at the moment.)

"Hey Yuffie..."

"Yeah?"

"Can you come over?"

"Um... Ah... I can't stay long or anything, but- "

Fifteen minutes later, Yuffie was holding Kairi's hair back as poor Kairi was bent over a toilet yacking her guts out. There went her damn breakfast.

x x x

It was later that evening that Yuffie received a certain call from a certain someone. Now, assuming that you were being dangled over a pit of lava by your _earlobes_ and you had five seconds to save your life before being consumed by the bubbling mass of molten rock... well, let's just say you had to answer a question. And let's say that question was: 'Who's calling Yuffie at two in the morning?'

Would you be able to answer correctly?

Or would you tumble to your death, crying due not to your unfortunate fate, but to your sadly stretched earlobes?

Well, assuming you would have shouted, 'Irvine, you dick!' at the top of your lungs, you would've been saved. Not so sure about the rest of you. But the Irvine-you-dick-ers would have been perfectly fine. Come to think of it...

"Yuffie!" It was Irvine. Yuffie couldn't help but snarl. It was something that came close to a reflex of sorts.

"Irvine, you dick! What are you doing calling me at two in the morning!" she snapped, glaring icily at the wall as she talked through the phone. It was late (or rather, 'early' would have been the proper terminology), she was grumpy, and she'd recently been sorely reminded of the fact that she had no sex life. On a regular basis, that last one wouldn't have gotten to her at all. But the fact that it was Kairi who pointed it out with her tale of Larxene... well, that just put the sting right in it.

But Irvine's voice didn't hold its usual jaunty, cocky, boyish nature. In fact, Yuffie was almost worried by the tone she heard over the phone. And sure enough, her worries were confirmed in ten seconds.

"Yuffie... It's Mr. Tigi. He's in the hospital."

x x x

Anyone catch the Raspberry Heaven reference? Also, the scene at Shriner's Park is based on the song by (oh come on, you saw it coming) Melissa Etheridge, called 'Shriner's Park', of course, and the song Leon's singing in The Emporium is Rufus Wainwright's 'Rebel Prince.' There we go, I think that covers it.

Aaaannnnd I'm just gonna stop doing chapter previews because while they can be helpful for me and you, I rarely stick to them. Clearly. So it sorta defeats the purpose, ne? XP My Oh My has **five** chapters left, so heads up everyone! From here on out, it's plot overall, angst through Larxene and Naminé, fluff through Yuffie and Kairi, and... uh... yeah, well, Leon and Cloud are mostly plot puppets, what can I say.


	6. Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

**My Oh My**

'Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit'

When Leon came back at sat down at the table, Cloud began.

x x x

Once upon a time, there was a kid. He was a nice kind of kid, a little quiet, but a nice kid all the same. He'd moved around a lot in his little six years of existence and he wasn't very skilled when it came to making friends. He was horrible at soccer, he couldn't dribble a basketball to save his life, he couldn't draw, play piano, ski, or ride a bike like any of the other kids. To put it bluntly, the boy wore the Velcro-strap sneakers of an outcast and they weren't about to come off any time soon.

Whenever he found out they were moving, he'd always get foolishly excited, bouncing cheerfully around the house nonstop until the promised moving day where they'd all pack into a van, him, his mom and his dad, and all head off to some bright new world where there was always the hope of doing things right that time around. He could save up some of his lunch money to buy a bike and get some nice kid to teach him how to ride it. That was his dream, and to his six-year-old eyes, it was such a bright and happy dream that there was no resisting it.

His family wasn't exactly poor. They'd first started showing up around here after they'd lived in China for a while, where the kid was born. He spoke Chinese fluently, just like his parents. He had a long, complicated, but nonetheless beautiful name. His penmanship with characters was passable and he was proud of his heritage. But time took its toll, and people in general wore the family down. People sometimes wear everyone down and they don't even know they're doing it.

They couldn't pronounce the last name, so they shortened it.

They couldn't pronounce the boy's name, so they shortened that too.

But he wanted so badly to be accepted that he didn't seem to mind. He would smile and laugh along with all the other children, even if he really didn't know what they were all laughing about in the first place. Sometimes it only made him look even more foolish, and he couldn't understand why, for a child who isn't taught at an early age the difference between meanness and kindness will carry that lack of knowledge with them for the rest of their life.

Such was the case with this boy.

Sure, he knew what was right and wrong. He knew so because his parents told him so. His father, on the rare occasions that he appeared at home when the boy was awake, would set the boy on his lap and tell him everything he knew of the world and its mysterious workings. This wasn't exactly all that much, for while they moved around a great deal, the boy's father was not very intelligent, but he did his best and for that no one could ask any more of him. The boy's mother would sweetly explain the golden rule to her son as she understood it, slicing peppers and stirring noodles while she talked to her boy at her side.

"What is right is what feels good to you. If it feels good to you, you should do the same for other people, for it is what is right and good in the world."

His mother and father were both beautiful and handsome, respectively, and though their son seemed to somehow miss out on their attractive genes, they loved him dearly all the same. With his mother's flawless olive skin and delicately almond-shaped eyes and his father's soft black hair and perfect teeth, they more than made up for their slightly less-than-average-looking son. And even though he had no friends and even though they were not rich, the little boy was happy just belong with his mother and father who could teach him what they knew.

Then there came that fateful day which changed the boy's life forever.

The local carnival was in town and the boy's parents had saved up a small fortune (by their terms) with which to take the boy to the fair and give him the best evening of his young life. And by all standards, it was just that. The carnival was spectacular, the kind you can only find in the sweet countryside town lying amidst nothing at all. That kind of sort of paradise of lights and wheels and screams and thrills, of cotton candy, snow cones, and prizes for the slightest thing at all.

It was a stray bumper car that did them in. The boy would never forget the tragedy, watching as his parents walked on ahead, hands clasped so lovingly together and exchanging that proud glance of parents who have done well by their only child. And in the next instant the wooden guard rail was broken, the cables were snapping, and there was a thunk, a chunk, and that, as they say, was that.

Being the amazingly resilient boy he was, it only took him two days to begin to speak again, though it was in clipped words and halting phrases, almost all of it coming out in his native tongue which greatly perplexed his aunt and uncle, whom he came to live with following his parents' unfortunate death. They lived in a house which sat in the woods which sat by the creek which ran through a town he'd never heard of in a place he'd never been.

And just like that he was alone. His newfound guardians preferred to stay out with friends rather than spend time with their nephew. He didn't know how to go about making friends. He didn't know how to go about living in one place, speaking one language, but most of all, he could not understand the society he found himself surrounded by. Elderly people, deeply embittered by bankruptcy, jaded by jealousy, greed, and basic modern human nature- these were his neighbors and his accquaintences.

For a child who grew up in a place where money was never spoken of and never directly viewed as either a blessing or a curse, the boy could have no opinion of it and he could have no understanding of those who did have an opinion of it. And those who did indeed have an opinion, an obsession with it, they could understand him no better.

Day by day, the boy spent his time indoors, making up all the fairytale stories of adventure and happiness that awaited him. All he had to do was wait just a little longer, he kept telling himself. Just a little longer and I won't have to be here anymore. I won't have to live with them. I won't have to talk about things I don't understand and I won't have to pretend I understand them.

And day by day, as he grew more and more lonely, the boy, however unknowingly, began to realize something about himself and the world around him. It was something his parents had not told him, for when they'd passed away, they themselves had yet to learn it. It was something that his aunt and uncle did not know then and would never grow to know in their entire lifetime. And yet it was something so simple and so obvious that one would think the entire world would come to understand, to know, and to acknowledge the one simple fact that the boy learned in his solitude.

And that was that children, by the sheer act of wishing and dreaming, are capable of gaining anything they desire. By being thrown into such loneliness, the boy unconsciously opened a series of doors, unlocked a series of padlocks, and let loose the very thing that many parents try so hard to keep bottled up within their children. That rampant ability of make-believe that boggles minds and sparks life, that very simple little thing that could very simply be called 'imagination.'

But it wasn't just like that.

Through his loneliness, the boy was so desperate for friends and company- for anyone who truly loved him- that he created them. And he did so with a child's mind, and he smiled with a child's mouth, but his realization of them and his belief in them was very much adult in every sense of the word. And that was why they were real. They were real and true as anything else in this world, as trees, rivers, deer, and fish. They had blood and they had muscle, flesh, organs, hearts and minds, thoughts and feelings, and though he would never admit it himself, the boy was a genius.

He grew older in that house, no longer a boy, but a young man. And still he believed and still he had faith, thus they stayed with him. They stayed real because they were real, because their creator loved them and because they loved him in return for making them as they were. And when the time came for him to leave, for he'd learned as much as he could about unworldly things like algebra, physics, chemistry, and biology, they begged him not to go.

'Please, please,' they cried. 'What shall become of us if you abandon us now? What if we cease to exist? What if you forget us and we never see you again?'

But the young man smiled and shook his head. Just once. He told them they would stay because he believed, because his belief would never leave him, no matter the years that passed over his body. He told them they would be safe there, in that house where he'd spent his lonely childhood, dreaming, imagining, and eventually creating. And he assured them that if they needed him or if he needed them, there would never be anything to keep them apart, for they were his light and he was theirs in return.

And then the young man left.

And though they waited with baited breath, he never returned to the house again.

x x x

"Is there anything I can get for you, Mr. Tigi? Anything at all, really!"

Yuffie had probably been zipping around the hospital room since she arrived that morning. Irvine couldn't really tell if it was the small coffee he'd given her to keep her awake or if it was simply some sort of subconscious nervousness that kept her wired for so long. Personally, Irvine didn't care. She'd been tucking in sheets, fluffing pillows, folding socks, and ringing off the list of questions left and right since she set foot in the door.

Mr. Tigi didn't seem to mind.

He simply smiled his own toothy smile and shook his head, the foam pillow beneath him stifling the movement to little more than a quiver of his skull. Yuffie still got the message and she tried to stay still, but her toes wiggled and her arms crossed and uncrossed...

By now you're confused.

I believe a recap is in order.

Alright.

Shortly after getting her call from Irvine and staring at the wall opposite her in shock (precisely one minute after getting the call from Irvine, as a matter of fact), Yuffie had frantically asked what was wrong, where they were, and what she could do. The answers were as follows.

"I don't know if there's much you can do, but you can come here if you want."

"We're at Destati Memorial Hospital, just off the highway, yanno, like when you're heading south."

"I don't think anyone's really certain what happened yet. He just fell over and stopped breathing. Maybe a stroke or something, but they don't know. Everyone here's confused, lame, or too stupid to know the difference between a pair of pliers and a thermometer."

"Can you get over here?"

"...Now?"

And she did. Yuffie was dressed in two blinks of an eye and running around searching for her car keys, but gave up after five minutes and just started jogging. She didn't know why. There was some sort of urgency in her blood and some sort of pressure in the back of her mind that told her very calmly but very firmly, "No, give up, move on, let's go." In that order, with that efficiency.

Yuffie had no choice **but** to go, in other words.

The town was dull and quiet in the dead of night, moonlight playing off the leaves as they flicked to and fro in the soft breeze. Yuffie's sneakers slapped against the concrete, the hood of her sweater slapped against her back, and her heart was somehow managing not to slap and not to scream because the same urgency that had driven her out of her apartment was the same urgency that veiled her entire body, focusing it towards the one purpose of getting to the hospital as fast as possible.

And yet the strangest thing happened...

"...I think a good book would be just fine, Miss Yuffie. Just a nice, nice book, I think."

Sorry, we had to take a break from the recap for a moment.

"I'll find you a great book, Mr. Tigi. I promise. I'll go to the bookstore right after work and I'll find you the perfect one, okay?" Yuffie nodded her head up and down eagerly, her short black hair flipping about her face as she did so.

"The bookstore..." Mr. Tigi's voice took on a quiet fondness as his fingertips brushed back and forth against the sterilized blanket covering him. "The last time I went there, I was confused. There were only three people in the entire store... ah, nevermind. Nevermind, nevermind. It is nothing."

The room smelled of Lysol and detergent.

"No, really, what is it?"

The hallways were silent and felt like the dead.

"It is nothing. Thank you, Miss Yuffie, for your kindness."

And Yuffie simply smiled and nodded again, then shook her head, then nodded again. She couldn't decide which was truly appropriate, so she made up for it by simply doing both.

"No problem!"

"Yeah, I mean, Yuffie and I are practically your kids anyway, right?" Irvine chimed in from across the room, where he stood leaning against the wall with him arms crossed contemplatively over his chest. "Without you, Tigi, we'd be starving on the streets and homeless."

"Yes, yes. My children, hm? Hahaha. Hoo... if I had ever had children, I do wish they be as good as you. I do wish."

But the recap. Now where was I?

As Yuffie ran down the streets, she saw in the distance a single globe of light drawing nearer and nearer. It turned out, in fact, to be a motorcycle, puttering along with a deep and mellow hum. She would later wonder what compelled her to trust the motorcyclist. She would later wonder what compelled the motorcyclist to trust her. But either way, she would later assume that it was some sort of fortune, some sort of twisted swing of chance, luck, and fate that made it Larxene who hid behind her own helmet that night.

And though Yuffie wouldn't know who that cyclist was for some time, Larxene would know. And she herself would wonder about it when she found herself bored or alone. Amidst everything else, it seemed, there was always Fate, always willing to rear its head, ugly or beautiful, mystical or mundane- simply depending on whatever mood had hit it that day.

Yuffie had hitched a ride on the back of a motorcycle and made it to the hospital after all. And that is your recap, ladies and gentlemen.

x x x

Cloud had curled up in an empty soap dish, several clean tissues draped over his little body as lightweight blankets. When Leon woke up, the first thing he saw was this tiny figure sleeping peacefully beside him, the makeshift bed set up on his own bedside table, right alongside his alarm clock. ...It was then that Leon sadly came to the conclusion that the previous night had not, in fact, been a horrible dream as he'd hoped.

"Cloud...?" Leon tried whispering into the air, the voice ghosting past his lips, the breath just rustling the little tissues enough to stir the sleeping creature beneath. With several slow and testing beats of his wings, Cloud sat up and stretched, tiny arms above his tiny head, hair even more disarrayed than usual. He shot Leon a smile and Leon blinked. He greeted Leon with a, 'Good morning!' and Leon stared.

Finally Leon said, "I still don't get it."

"What don't you understand?"

"Everything. Like why you're here."

Mouth puckering into a soft frown, Cloud's fingers absently pulled at a loose fiber in his worn vest, head cocking to one side as he thought to himself. Thinking seemed to be something that Cloud did a thorough job of when he chose to engage in such a process, so by the time he responded, Leon had almost forgotten he'd inquired about anything at all in the first place.

"I'm here to give back what you've all lost."

"Where'd it go? What was it?"

"It's a lot of things. It's different for everyone. Sometimes it's very far away and very hard to reach out and grasp. Sometimes it's very close. But you humans don't seem to understand it."

"...Um..."

Cloud shot Leon a toothy grin, teeth perfect and white, sparkling in his mouth as he said, "Are ay kay?"

Leon groaned, throwing a pillow over his face and giving up. His sanity had left him. Nothing left to do but crawl under a pillow. Just like a kid in an igloo, a bear in den. Crawl back under your rock, Leon, you can't handle the world. You never could and you never will be able to. _Surrender!_

"What does it stand for?" came Cloud's little bell-chimed voice. A distant prickling at his arm alerted Leon of the disturbing fact that Cloud had somehow managed to wriggle under the pillow with him. Bizarre? Oh yes. But with the way the past twelve hours had gone, Leon couldn't exactly say he was surprised.

"...I don't know."

"You're not thinking."

"I don't **know**," Leon repeated more firmly, his sharp voice being dulled ever so slightly by the down of the pillow still covering his face. Another soft brush against his arm, his elbow, tracing up towards his shoulder and the quiet voice which disagreed with a mild smile and a soft tone.

"Think. _Random_..."

_Are ay kay. Are ay kay. Arrrre... R. A. K._

"Random acts of kindness." Bing.

"Exactly."

"What about it?"

"Spontaneous, isn't it? Random. Where'd you hear about it?"

Here Leon had to think for a moment. Cloud continued to press at him both with words and with nudging against his cheek with a petite foot. Normally Leon would've just squashed the bugger and gone straight back to bed in a desperate attempt to rekindle his relationship with his own sanity. But even he couldn't shake the fact that there was something mildly intriguing going on here that he'd never before encountered in his entire life.

And, as human nature demanded, Leon had no choice but to take that encounter and run with it. For all he was worth and as fast as he could.

"I heard about it, I guess... maybe when I was in grade-school? Third grade... second, maybe. Or fourth. I can't really remember. Something like that. Somewhere around there." Leon frowned into his pillow before pulling it off his head with a final flick of his wrist, sitting upright in bed as Cloud grabbed a strand of choppy brown hair and bolted right up along with him, swinging himself into a comfortable position on Leon's shoulder.

He began to explain, then, very slowly and very carefully so as not to throw the delicate train of human thought far from the track where it needed to be.

"There are people, Leon, who don't grow up as they should. There isn't a definition for a proper childhood, nor is there a universally proper way to raise a child. But there's certain standards you all have to meet, certain things you all have to come to know, accept, and live by. Things that have to be lost and things that have to be gained. It is that way that the human race runs itself so efficiently- by programming these necessities into each and every one of you before you come of age.

"But every once in a while, a kid doesn't get that. They don't get it, Leon. They miss something, get too much of something else, and before you know it, humanity's whole system is being wrinkled and screwed around with all because of one little kid's misfortune. They don't grow up right. In a world where you're expected to go forward, they stand still- maybe even going backwards altogether."

"...So what does this have to do with me?" Leon ventured cautiously, already fearing he knew the answer and already fearing some sort of Apocalypse swiftly gathering just beyond the horizon.

Cloud smiled softly and leaned forward, trying to catch Leon's eye but only succeeding in nearly falling right off the man's shoulder and into his lap. Steadying himself with several flaps of his wings and flails from his popsicle-stick arms, Cloud did his level best to continue as he could.

"Remember how I told you that you were missing something?"

"...Yeah."

"Well... you are. And not just you. I mentioned... Larxene, Naminé, Yuffie, Kairi... they'll all missing things. You're all missing something. There's something keeping you all from having that mindset or that... that... You have the minds of children, the hearts of children. And I tried to tell Naminé this, but-"

"Wait, Naminé?"

"Oh sure you know her." Cloud blinked. "She's Larxene's friend. Larxene works for you. And Kairi rooms with her. And Yuffie's friends with-"

"Okay, okay, but where are you going with all this!" Leon was getting frustrated now. It's not every day that some little pixie critter barged into his life, declared him to be a flawed member of society, and then proceeded to go about trying to 'correct' him. The idea in itself not only seemed disturbing, but also sort of communistic. _Or something like that at any rate. _

As the minutes ticked by, Cloud took his time to backtrack, recover, regain, and readdress everything Leon had questions about. No, Cloud wasn't saying Leon was flawed. No, Cloud wasn't saying he had to be 'corrected' in any way. And no, Cloud was not sent by any sort of secret government force. Cloud came as he was, and from the sound of it, he could go no further.

"I can only stay with people who believe in me. If people stop believing me, they stop seeing me. If they stop seeing me, I stop existing."

"So... as long as there are little kids, you'll live, right? You're basically immortal."

The room fell quiet. It was a quiet that did not feel natural. It was a quiet that made Leon feel guilty. That made him feel as though he had said the wrong thing and the wrong time in the wrong place to the wrong person. ...Or rather, to the wrong faerie.

"Not exactly," Cloud finally answered quietly.

"..."

"...So... on that note, let's go."

"Where are we going?"

"To find the others!" Cloud flapped his wings once, twice, and then landed nimbly on the top of Leon's head. "I tried to explain all this to Naminé, but she couldn't understand. You, Leon, you understand. I know it. So you've gotta help me out, okay?"

"...Whatever."

"Alright! ...Now then. ...How do you use one of those... 'tea-lee-foons?'"

x x x

Later that morning, Kairi appeared at the Laund-Dry-Mat-O, dressed in a pair of loose denim shorts and a sun-bleached t-shirt that may once have been a very bright blue. Slip-on sneakers clapping against the cheap linoleum floor, Kairi slipped through the door, the bell jingling behind her. Sure enough Yuffie was seated behind the counter. Or at least... it looked like she was.

Sort of.

The girl's eyes were half closed and fogged with that all-too-familiar feeling of irrepressible sleep. The kind that just hovers quietly above your brain, just until the moment when you least expect it. Then it's just wham, bam, allakazam and poof. You're practically knocked out for the rest of the day. Bags under her eyes, head supported in her clasped hands, Yuffie was the perfect picture of this very feeling.

"Yuffie, are you okay? I heard about Mr. Tigi..."

Yuffie cocked her head to the slightly, her eyes opening just a bit more as Kairi approached. There was some click of recognition in the back of her mind, somewhere around the same time it was realized that she'd been asked a question. _Nevermind that._ "You did?"

"News travels fast in little towns."

"Yeah... it does, huh?"

"...Do you guys need any help around here? I mean, I have to work from eight to four, but after that I can always stop by and help out..."

"We're fine thanks. But..." Yuffie's eyes almost slid shut again. Or at least, Kairi thought they did. It turned out the girl was just blinking. ...Blinking... _veeery_ slowly. "If things get outta hand, I'll let you know, okay?"

"Alright... Well, good luck." Kairi turned. Kairi blinked. Kairi paused. "...Oh, um... Yuffie? ...About last night... I'm really sorry. I was just upset and..."

"Hey, everyone has the right to a little drinking when life gets 'em down, yanno? You're plenty entitled to it." Yuffie paused then, frowning slightly and wondering where her straw hat and pitchfork were. So she was a little addlebrained? So what? "Besides, it was no problem. Just know that I expect the favor to be returned when I get drunk, m'kay?" Yuffie grinned as brightly as she could, but it definitely sucked the energy right out of her.

"...Of course!" Kairi laughed nervously and rubbed the back of her neck with one hand, rocking forward and backward on the balls of her feet. In case you couldn't tell, something peculiar was going on. ...You know. In case you needed the heads up. "Uh... I had another question!"

"Mm?"

"...I have a shirt! Annnd... it's a really nice shirt. But I think I might have put too much starch on it the last time I put it through the wash."

"...And?"

"Annnd... I was wondering if you knew how to get some of the starch out of this shirt of mine and make it more comfortable and everything... Because it's really a nice shirt and all, but it's so... um... starchy."

"Well if you bring it in we might have some detergent or something. Irvine'll probably know how to handle it if I don't."

"...Okay... thanks..."

"No problem!"

And that was the moment in which a very peculiar thing happened.

Kairi suddenly felt as though she were completely surrounded by Yuffie- though such a thing was quite impossible due to the laws of physics and human anatomy. But see, there was something, some change in the air or the Force (as you could possibly call it) surrounding the two, switching completely in some unexplainable manner that made Kairi's eyes widen and her heart clench painfully in her chest.

For almost half a second, she actually believed she was on the verge of having a heart attack.

And then it hit.

There was a way in which Kairi was somehow breathing in Yuffie, be it by feeling the girl's nature, smelling her perfume, or drinking in the look of her, slumped over the counter with a drawn and sleepy gaze painted across her pale face. There was something which could (and still cannot) possibly be recalled through words or act alone, yet it is something we have most likely all experienced in our lives. It is a rush to the top, a balance on the edge, and the slow-yet-rapid tip and fall towards the other side.

It's called something like... suddenly falling in love. So hopelessly and so completely that it's undoubtedly life-altering, though the entire process takes all of perhaps four or five split seconds.

Kairi, having never been one to stand idle and stupid (most of the time, anyway), did the only thing her heart and mind could allow her to- the one thing they could compromise on. And that would be how Kairi swiftly closed the distance between her and Yuffie, balanced on her tiptoes and pressing her lips against the other, taller girl's for half a moment.

...Had a spectator been present, they would have said it looked more like they were bumping chins.

...Had Kairi been capable of talking like a normal human being, she would have said it was hardly even a kiss.

But neither of these things would really have mattered to Yuffie, who stood there, mouth agape, eyes popping out of her head, and Kairi's receipt strangled between both quivering hands clenched in front of her.

"..."

"..."

"...God, I'm sorry," was all Kairi could manage to say. She wore her own look of shock, but hers was a far less ridiculous one than Yuffie's. Hers actually fit her. Somehow. Or maybe it was just that somehow, Kairi was experienced with all this. ...A sad thought, but a possibility, no?

"...Ahh..."

"Yuffie...?"

"...Ahhh..."

"...I'm gonna go! Okay? I'm gonna go now. I'm gonna... I'm just... around the... I'm... sorry..."

"Kairi," Yuffie managed to choke out, just before Kairi hit the door, the bells, and her feet almost dragged her out the door at a maddening pace. Cautiously, the other girl turned around, fear scrawled all over her face, her body rigid and stiff as a bored. Absolutely and undoubtedly petrified. Maybe if Yuffie hadn't been so shaken up herself, she would've felt some sort of guilt about it all. Instead, she simply said, in fragmented speech and with a hoarse and frazzled voice, "I have to go to the bookstore later... Wanna come with me?"

For the sake of Kairi and Yuffie's reputations, the details will now begin to grow just a little lax concerning their afternoon and their trip to the bookstore. It was a thing which was spontaneous and uncalled for and Yuffie herself couldn't even begin to understand what the hell she was thinking with pulling Kairi back like that. Her mind was spinning those questions around, Kairi's was spinning her own set. Between the two there wasn't much conversation, but rather, there was a pull, be it of camaraderie or something else. But there was no mention of 'the kiss.'

And yet when Yuffie and Kairi first entered the nearly deserted bookstore, there was one particular note in their harmonies of mental questions- just one lone note- that stuck the same pitch at the same moment in both girls. Standing there in the middle of the aisle, they looked to the left. And they looked to the right.

Philosophy on the left.

Financing on the right.

To the left was nothing but thought and thinking, deep and provoking, stimulating and puzzling. It was empty, aside from the tomes that lined the shelves, far too old and wise to believe that either of the two girls would so much as run a tentative finger over a calloused spine.

And yet there, to the right, were three men. Button-up shirts, neatly pressed slacks, gleaming loafers and somber ties looped around their necks like some sort of societal noose. All stood with a straight-as-a-board posture, all eyes rooted towards the shelves, moving side to side and browsing and praying for some sort of divine intervention. Give me a book, give me a fortune. Better yet, give me a promotion.

Yuffie and Kairi, in their sneakers, shorts, and t-shirts, stood to the side, stood out of sight. That was the note, right there. Did you miss it? That was their first realization of the undeniable. And though they didn't know it at the time, that was only the very beginning.

"...Come on, let's just... go look somewhere else."

x x x

That afternoon, Kairi shuffled into the apartment. Her spirits were down, her brain was muddled, and much like Yuffie was plagued by her sleepy-feeling, Kairi suddenly found herself plagued by the every-relationshp-I-have-turns-to-dust-in-my-hands-feeling. _Flashback to her pothead chemistry teacher from highschool. "All we are is dust in the wind." Atoms and electrons and..._

"Larxene..." Kairi's eyes widened as she stared at the older girl seated at the island counter of the kitchenette, looking as though she'd never left. Looking as though all was perfectly fine and well, though it most certainly was anything but.

"Hey there, Pooh." Larxene pulled the stool next to her out two feet, patting the top of it once with her hand before returning them to the pockets of the leather jacket she wore. "Have a seat?" For lack of another response to get going for her, Kairi obeyed. And from her pocket Larxene pulled a large foil ball, roughly the size of her fist, cradled in her hand like a precious egg. "I got something for you."

"...Oh..." Kairi blinked with confusion as Larxene dropped it into her open hands before digging around in her other pocket and pulling out an identical foil package. "Umm... What... what is it?" Kairi asked.

"An orange."

"...?"

"It's a chocolate orange."

"..."

"Candy," Larxene clarified with an amused smirk stretching across her mouth. "You eat too much of that fat free yogurt garbage and you're skinny as a post. So eat it." Resting an elbow on the countertop, Larxene continued to watch her poor puzzled friend with increasing delight as Kairi fumbled with the foil, tried to peel at the sticker, and finally surrendered as Larxene said, "You have to break it open first."

_Break it open?_

"How to I do that?" Larxene rolled her eyes and pointed to the sticker Kairi had previously been trying to peel off. _Hmm... a little cartoon hand smashing the little cartoon orange against a cartoon table. How interesting_. "...Oh."

"You have to hit it just right... so all the pieces don't get stuck together. So it breaks apart perfectly."

Kairi pulled back her hand, the chocolate orange cradled inside, wrapped in blue foil. Sweet, innocent little foil ball. ...WHACK! Kairi peeled back the foil to survey the job she'd done and was pleasantly surprised to find the previously solid sphere of chocolate broken apart into little bite-size orange pieces. She grinned and showed her little triumph to Larxene, who couldn't help but laugh at the sight.

"...I did it, see?"

"...Hm." Larxene looked into the open package of foil in her own lap. Pieces broken and chipped every which-way, stuck together or simply falling apart. "Practice what you preach, huh?"

"Or something like it."

The two fell silent after that, occasionally nibbling on bits of chocolate here and there, but mostly lost in their own thoughts. But their thoughts and notes, no matter how musical and how intricate, did not cross. They did not share notes or melodies, but that didn't necessarily make them poorly composed, now did it? Just think about it. Turn on your own mental stereo for a second.

"...I will explain, you know. I promise," Larxene muttered, cautiously penetrating the silence as best and as carefully as she could.

"I know you will."

"...And..."

"It's okay, Larxene." Kairi smiled, but Larxene wouldn't meet her eyes. _Strange._ "Really."

"You know I... ran into Naminé last night."

"...Oh? What'd she have to say? Anything in particular?"

"How is it that some people can be so stupidly caring? I mean... It just doesn't make sense. It just doesn't _make sense_. There's no logic to it and there's no possible way emotion could be driving it along."

"And why not?"

Larxene crumpled up her empty sheet of foil in her hand, the smell of chocolate and the smell of oranges lingering in the air. It was something she liked. It was something she had desperately hoped would cheer her up. Sort of like... buying a motorcycle in the middle of the night...

"Get real, Pooh bear. We've barely known each other for two weeks. How much emotion is there to go off of?"

"...Well... I consider you my friend, you know. Maybe you don't feel that way or anything... but I don't have a lot of friends who are girls. You know...? I mean..." Kairi pulled gently at the idea, trying to coax it out of her mind, but it was more stubborn than she thought. Instead she simply sighed and put the feeling into words as best as she could, hands fisted in the effort of buckling down and settling for less than she meant it to mean. "...I've never had a friend like you before. It sounds stupid to say and probably even stupider to hear, but... it's true. I just... I can't explain it very well."

"...What would you say if I told you I killed someone? ...Just for... you know... hypothetically speaking, I mean."

Now during that day, Kairi had experienced several things that she would easily classify as weird. Her mood swings, her impulsive actions, and even her perfectly split orange. But perhaps it was the way Larxene said it. Perhaps it was the way the blonde's eyes stayed fixated on the countertop, unmoving and unflinching, cold, hard, and almost uncaring. Or perhaps, just _perhaps_ it was the sudden click of memory and the act of everything sliding in the place, slowly, but very, very surely.

_ "I once knew this woman. The really old, but really sweet type, you know? I used to go visit her sometimes when I was in high school. My mom always made me bring her cookies or something. I think my mom felt bad for her or something... maybe because she was so old, maybe because she lived there all alone. But once a week her granddaughter would go and visit her. So between me and this granddaughter of hers, I didn't think she had it so bad."_

_ "...What happened?"_

_ "Oh." Larxene blinked, almost as though she were surprised that Kairi had spoken at all in the first place. Then, she very calmly and very clearly stated, "She killed herself. She had someone help her, you know..."_

"...Larxene... what happened to that woman?"

But Larxene didn't have the chance to answer, for at that very moment, the phone rang.

(x) (x) (x)

Sorry again for the belated update. XO I kept getting waaay sidetracked. Not to mention how I keep changing the chapters and what I want them to accomplish. Muaha. The fic is pas the halfway marker! Yay! It only gets more fun for me from here on out.


	7. Like Seaweed

**My Oh My**

'Like Seaweed'

_"I'd hope you would all know why you're here, but... I guess not, right? ...Right. Okay. Let's see if I can begin somewhere... Um... Where to begin, where to begin...?"_

x x x

Larxene had once viewed her grandmother in the adoring way in which all children view their grandparents. Somewhere amidst the gently wrinkled face and the delicate blue veins just beneath the surface of the flesh, there is something intangible that all grandparents have, having seen as their own children have given birth to their children, watching, waiting, and seeing the cycle continue. Watching, waiting, and knowing they are part of that cycle, even.

It was that certain special something that made Larxene love her grandmother. The old woman's husband had died in a bar brawl some years before Larxene was born and this gave the woman a sharp tongue and an even sharper temper, fending for herself in her later years as she did. "Larxene," she would warble in her ancient, sweet voice, "don't you ever let this happen to you. Don't you ever fall for a man who loves a drink and a fight more than he loves you. Don't you ever do that honey. Just don't you _ever_ do it."

"Yes, Grandma." Larxene would nod her little head and wring her little hands, nervous and timid, wanting so much to make the old woman happy. She would do anything, she thought, just to see her old grandmother smile and know that she was the cause- the root of that happiness.

Roots, though, grow deep. Far past topsoil and far past heredity. For Larxene, she saw a common bond between her and her grandmother.

"When I was a girl Larxene, you know what I used to do?"

"What, Grandma?"

"Well there was this old farmhouse some ways up the street. Back then there were forests stretching all over these parts. _All over_. And this little friend of mine... I can't remember her name... Oh what was it? ...I just can't for the life of me remember. But this friend and I, we used to have to trek all the way over to this farmhouse once a week for our milk. It must've been a five mile walk, Larxene. _Five miles_ in the blazing heat of summer and the freezing cold of winter..."

Yes, there was a common bond. A common ground. A ground so thick with roots you'd think it was solid through and through. No breaking it, no digging through it. No erosion and no tremors to jolt its surface.

"And one day it just so happened the woman there asks us... She asks us, 'You two walk all the way over here? All the way around the woods?' And we say... 'Yes, m'am, yes we do.' And so she tells us about this path that cuts through the woods instead of looping around it. Now, I'd been told to follow along the main road, the one that looped all the way around the outskirts of the woods. But the path through the middle must have cut the walk down by about three miles. So of course we headed off down this path the next time we had to go for milk."

And yet somewhere, deep with in the tangled roots of her grandmother's life, there lay a deeper ground between them that Larxene could not shake. She could not comprehend it, she could not define it. Back then, she did not understand what it was or what it did. To her, her grandmother was immortal- a figure that would always be there until the end of time, unchanging and solid as the very earth she played hop-scotch on. Just _that_ solid and true.

"We must've reached about the dead center of the woods that morning... We were talking and laughing, you know. Like girls do. And all of a sudden this huge black bear just comes wandering up from the woods, right onto the path."

Some things simply happen because they need to happen in order for people to grow as human beings.

"Of course we were both terrified. But..."

Some things simply happen because they need to happen in order for people to learn from their mistakes.

"I remembered what my uncle had told me, Larxene. My uncle... he was a forest ranger, you know. He'd once said, 'Now if a bear ever comes up to you, you know what you do? You do nothing. You don't run and you don't try to hide. You gotta stand there and suck it up. You gotta stand still.' So that's what I did. That's what we did, we stood still."

And yet most things happen because by some horrid twist of fate, some mysterious higher being has ruled it so. Maybe it's karma. Maybe it's not. But on the off chance that it is, what had Larxene done in her small innocent little life up to then to make her deserving of such a fate? What had she done to deserve to lose everything without even knowing it was slipping away in the first place?

For that was what happened. Over the years, though Larxene didn't realize it, something was shifting. That ground she'd relied on, her grandmother's spirit, mind, heart, soul- whatever you want to call it- began to die. And she didn't- couldn't- comprehend that death because to Larxene, her grandmother was perfectly fine. There were no doctors, there was no medicine. No coughing fits, no sniffles, no fevers. There was just Larxene, her grandmother, and the unmentionable link of heredity and the deeper It connecting the two of them.

Something was pitted against them and they'd done nothing wrong. To put it very plain and simply, it was nothing more than the suffering of the innocent, overlooked quite frequently, but real all the same. So very, very real.

"Morning Grandma!"

"Good morning..." There came the puzzled looks.

"Grandma?"

And the small shakes of the head, the face, the sweetly aged face that tried to beg and plead for answers to questions that the woman herself never wanted to ask. _Please tell me your name, child. I believe I can't remember. Are you my granddaughter?_

When Larxene entered the sixth grade, her grandmother began to forget her visits on the weekend, her happy little blonde granddaughter bearing homemade cookies and lemonade, smiling as brightly as she could. She still wanted to make her happy. She would still do anything to make her happy. She was that devoted.

When Larxene entered the eighth grade, her grandmother began to forget her name and her features, the smiling child that aged through the pictures but was always still smiling and still hopeful. Larxene would try and understand as best as she could, but she couldn't understand. She still wanted to make her happy. She would still do anything to make her happy.

And as Larxene entered the ninth, the tenth, the eleventh, and the twelfth grade, more and more of her grandmother began to fade away. And as it was explained to her, there was nothing she could do. She was a bystander and there was nothing she could do to make her grandmother happy. That one little goal she'd lived for all those years was taken away by a twist of fate, by bad karma, and by the wicked humor of some power that watched on as Larxene fought so hard to comprehend the dirt beneath the roots and past their reaches, under the earth she couldn't get to, no matter how hard she tried.

That was the start of the woman's decline, for she saw what Larxene did not. She saw the flaws of her own mind and she felt the disease that dwelled there. And she _hated_ it. As time drew on, her hatred for it grew and grew, her granddaughter's devotion grew and grew, and no one could understand the things they couldn't see or feel. No one could really feel the dirt of it all. No one could understand that as the woman sat there and stared out her window, she could not find a self within her body. She could not find the memories to think back on, the 'good old days' or anything of the sort. She was no more than a bottle. A very old, very fragile bottle which had long since poured its contents for the world to see, for all of mankind to bask in its glorious hues and flavor. And now it was gone. It was dried up.

It was just gone.

Finally the day came.

Larxene, a senior in high school by then, stopped by on a Thursday afternoon to check up on her grandmother, who had long since been moved into an assisted living center after having been deemed a hazard to herself. She could no longer remember the simplest of things, from combing her hair to brushing her teeth. Words frequently came out in jumbled masses and she failed to process what many would have referred to as nothing more than a simple train of thought. And because of it, because of all of it, the woman did what she did.

That was how Larxene came to sit beside the bed and that was how she came to hear the slurred words whispered through the lips that had once kissed the top of her child's head and spoken words and stories that she'd grown to live by. That was how she began to cry and that was how she began to understand what no one else could- what no one her age _ever_ could.

That was how she was given the gun; that was how she took it in hand. Examined it with all the curiosity which ever could kill a cat, or more. Shook her head and snuffled and tried so very hard not to understand. _"Please, honey. Do it for me. Do it for me."_

Larxene had come to hold it, understand it, perhaps even cherish it, in her own strange way.

_"I don't want this anymore. Please, honey."_

And Larxene then came to fire it, ending one hell and starting another.

x x x

Cloud smiled, the action falling somewhere that nearly placed it as 'sweet,' though it could more correctly be classified as 'curious.' For indeed, as the small fellow surveyed the room of people around him, he felt slightly unsure as what exactly it was that he was supposed to do. The impulse he'd felt was very weak, but it was through that weakness that picked up on the urgency. _He needs me to do this before it's too late. Before his time runs out. Before my time runs out._

For in every person, faerie or no, there is a sort of idea of repayment, gratitude, and the concept of there always being 'strings attached.' Cloud owed it to him.

"You can all see me, right?" he asked tentatively, not wanted to shock, startle, or spook. Simply wanting to inform. Teach, and learn in return.

They sat, for your information, in a loose semi-circle, each spaced away from the other in unconscious fear of somehow catching their glance and finding that yes, they saw it too. It wasn't just them. They weren't just hallucinating. Maybe, with some sweet little twist of luck, they would wake up in the morning with that mowed-over feeling of having gotten high the previous day. This could all be some strobe light spectacle, some pipe dream moment in the sewer of their brains. That was what they were hoping.

And yet Yuffie knew. Naminé had shown her once before, in her visit with the other girl during the brief and shaky time when their friendship was first developing. What felt like years ago, was only a few weeks. And in those few weeks... how much had she changed? She glanced swiftly across the floor from the corner of her eye, her gaze landing on Kairi's left hand, supporting her weight as the girl sat cross-legged on the floor. The nail enamel caught the light as she drummed her fingers nervously against the linoleum floor, winking flirtatiously at the poor girl who quickly averted her eyes once again, only to find them drawn to Leon and the tiny man perched on his shoulder, watching them all with intrigue.

No way was this happening to her. ...Or if it was, she was definitely going to have to make it her business to complain to whatever head-honcho was calling the shots with this whole deal. It was just way too screwed up for her tastes. Way too screwed up. Way too gay.

_...Man and she actually... ugh, she **kissed** me_. Another glance. Nails, clicking quietly. Shorts loosely bunched around her legs, long and tucked beneath her, nicely tan, but not overly done.

No one noticed the strangled little choking sound that escaped Yuffie's mouth. Or if they did, they tried not to.

Naminé regarded Cloud with a soft confusion, her eyes laced with the fondness of a friend, but also with the eternal question. 'Why'd you do it?' Why did he feel he had to leave her like he did? Why had he come to her in the first place at all? Why were they all gathered there and what had gone wrong to cause Cloud to worry like he did? Somehow it was connected. In the end, it's all connected. That's just the way it works nowadays.

"Cloud..?"

"Right. Right, right. Um... why you're all here. Right. Well, I think..." Cloud began to fidget, his hands wrapping around a loose thread of Leon's jacket, pulling irritably at it with both hands, little face screwed up into a frown as he thought his words through while he said them. "Maybe sorta... you all _know_ why you're here. I think you do. You know. Kind of. But not _really_. Like, it's somewhere at the back of your mind. ...And I mean, maybe you can't tap into it or anything, but the reasoning is still there."

"What **I** want to know," Larxene said, scowling slightly and leaning forward as her tone took on a slightly nasty little edge to it, "is why I'm seeing a massive furry bug sitting on Leon's shoulder. Why he hasn't squashed it yet. And why I shouldn't."

"Larxene!" Naminé whined, tugging at the girl's sleeve and pulling her back away from poor little Cloud, who, at that particular moment, seemed just a little more pale than normal. Truth be told, he actually seemed to take on the complexion of a piece of chalk, but that's not entirely the point here. Naminé frowned, Larxene huffed, and the room fell into silence again, the only sound being that of Kairi's nervous nails upon the floor and Cloud's worried tugging at a piece of thread.

"Maybe you should tell them the whole story," Leon said softly.

x x x

Okay now, you can say. Just wait a minute. Where is this going? "You're telling me that here are five screwed up individuals suffering from some sort of severe set of hallucinations and they're all somehow sharing some sort of deeply fragmented and incorrect past?" Well, perhaps that's what I'm saying. To be honest, I can't really say. And to be unable to say what you're saying, well, that's quite a predicament.

But that's life, sweetie. Plain and simple. To believe, even for just half a second, that you could in any way pull off being some omnipotent and all-seeing being- well, that shows a severe lack of insight on your part. But now try and regard this as if you were watching a movie. This would be where you could press a button- any button- and sit and think, the characters' faces frozen in time on the pixels of your TV screen, your brows furrowed, your lips twisted into a frown. Your ice cream melting into that horrid ice-cream soup we all hate so much.

It's called thinking. And thinking is exactly what Cloud asked of those seated around him as he perched on Leon's shoulder, telling them what he knew in the easiest and simplest way he could possibly manage to tell it. It was confusing, no doubt, to be told that there was a force and an energy you couldn't grasp with mind or hand, somehow controlling whether or not you were fit enough to move on in life. Darwin at his greatest may even have thought such a thing debatable.

And yet there comes a point in time when logic is bound to escape you and thinking may not get you anywhere. So what do you do? Go with gut instinct? Act on impulse? Or perhaps you take what you do know and try to apply it as you see fit.

"This is bullshit," Larxene snapped, rising to her feet with finality and scooping her helmet off from the floor of Leon's rather crowded apartment. She turned to survey those still seated around her on the floor, an icy glare falling on anyone who dared to even think of meeting her eyes as she said, "I can't believe you're all actually sitting here and listening to this crap! I mean... come on! You can't honestly believe it or anything, right?"

"Larxene..." Naminé tried again. Did she understand? Well, that would depend on your definition of understanding. But the point is that she was making the effort to do so, which is certainly saying something.

Kairi and Yuffie sat side by side, blinking owlishly as Larxene stomped towards the door. Yuffie made no motion to stop her partly because she didn't know the other girl too well and partly because from what she did no of the other girl, she didn't really like her too well either. Kairi did nothing because Larxene had been puzzling her lately and the ground between them had just been brought back to being pretty level and stable. She'd be damned if she was about to go screw it all up again just to get Larxene to believe there really was a small pixie seated on Leon's shoulder.

"I'm not trying to upset you, Larxene..." Cloud murmured, safely tucked away next to Leon's ear. "I'm just trying to help."

"Why?" she spat. "Why the fuck would you try helping when you know nothing about any of us? When we never asked for you help in the first place? Why... Why this is all so completely fake it makes me want to puke! Why are you even bother-?"

"Because I just have to!" Cloud shouted. The room was thrown into a stunned silence as each of its normal-sized occupants turned to stare at the little faerie. Leon stayed motionless altogether, though his right ear was ringing uncontrollably thanks to the incredible amount of noise that such a tiny pair of lungs had produced. Unbelievable. "I just have to, okay?" the faerie repeated, quietly this time, trembling slightly from his last outburst and clinging to a strand of Leon's hair for support.

There was a hopeful sort of expectancy in his eyes, laced somewhere there amidst the blue and black and deep within the center, Cloud trying so hard to will Larxene to stay with his gaze alone. It was the only power he had, for if he tried to do anything else, Larxene could very well have him resembling a very botched job of a pancake in a few seconds flat. To say he was vulnerable... Well, then again, that might not be quite correct.

Leon glowered at Larxene. Kairi and Yuffie exchanged puzzled glances, but as soon as Yuffie realized that she was doing so, she quickly stopped, suddenly very interested in the hardwood floor. And Naminé... Larxene was shocked (and somehow, slightly hurt) to find that Naminé wasn't even looking at her. In fact, she was simply looking out the window as though she'd lost all and any interest whatsoever in the conversation at hand. ...If you could even go so far as to call it that.

"...You're all fucking crazy," snapped Larxene, just before the door slammed and the room fell back into silence. The only difference was that Larxene was no longer there.

Somewhere between the front door and her motorcycle, as Larxene was tugging on her helmet irritably and trying to conjure up as many nasty thoughts about the crazy little mental asylum she'd just left behind her, she began to start hoping that something would stop her. It was strange, not because half of her wanted one thing and half of her wanted another, but it was because as much as she wanted to leave and as satisfied as she _would_ be with leaving, what she wanted was for someone to act as though they cared enough to give a damn if she did one or the other.

If she stayed or if she left.

And she hoped, with every silly little ounce of it she had left in her pale and jaded body, she hoped for Naminé to come running outside and demand that Larxene stop acting like a bitch. That she surrendered and went back inside.

And as she slid on her helmet, Larxene realized something very peculiar about herself. What she wanted, more than anything else, was to give up. Not to die, not to find a beautiful, perfect love. But to find someone who she couldn't possibly stand up to. Who wouldn't back down in the face of sharp words and wit. What Larxene wanted was to fail miserably, and it was the one thing she could never manage to do. No matter how hard she tried.

But Larxene did leave and her motorcycle could be heard puttering off down around and away from them. And none of them moved to stop her and none of them, save one, thought twice about it. Kairi believed that it was no more than Larxene getting angry and upset again. Leon believed that it was no more than Larxene being a pompous bitch again. And Yuffie honestly didn't care one way or another, for she'd never _honestly_ been all that fond of the girl.

But Naminé had thought about it. She had hesitated and in the end she had chosen to do nothing. But she was aware of Cloud watching her. And she realized that between them was a common knowledge.

She should have done something.

That was how they all came to leave an hour or so later, more puzzled than ever and certainly more self-conscious. None of them could possibly understand the way this all was supposed to work out. Even Cloud.

_"I wish I could explain it to you better, really, I do, but... I don't know. I mean, I don't even know why I'm doing this... Or what it is that makes me know what I do about you. I mean, maybe I do know. But maybe I don't...?" _

That was how Naminé returned to her apartment, shaken and troubled and thinking far too much about herself. Where had she gone wrong? What exactly was it that she'd forgotten to do as a kid? She couldn't understand. She flopped onto the couch, she stared at the ceiling, she stared at the floor. She searched in every place in her apartment that she thought divine inspiration could be hiding, and still she came up with nothing.

And then her mind began to wander...

_Is Larxene okay? I should've said something... I should've done something... I wonder..._

Naminé's thoughts chased themselves in circles and lines, patterns across her muddled brain as she tried to sort through too much. She wished Cloud was still with her. She wished she wasn't alone in her damn apartment and she wished that she could understand what was going on around her.

She wished she could understand Larxene... She wished she could help Larxene...

And despite all of her wishes and wants, Naminé didn't dare think to voice her wish, or to do something so silly as to wish upon a star, for it was still broad daylight outside. And as her child's mind told her, nothing bad could ever happen in the daylight.

...So then what was it that had just happened?

x x x

Many hours later, Kairi found Larxene along the highway, her motorcycle pulled off to the side, her helmet in her lap. Larxene herself was seated far too precariously on the edge of the overpass, a breeze picking at the threads of hair and skin that made her up, brushing against the cloth that covered her up, and somehow creating an impenetrable shield around her that kept Kairi at bay.

...That kept Kairi from cursing and pulling her friend back to safety, far away from right along the edge. Larxene wanted to risk her life to sit somewhere that probably wasn't even that comfortable? Fine. Okay. Kairi took a deep breath, she strode forward, she tried to look as confident and demanding as possible. In reality, she was no better off than the rest of us.

For if you'll remember, Kairi was very normal.

But Larxene was also very normal. So it was pretty much just normalcy that Kairi was relying on to talk some sense into the girl, for they had almost nothing else between them in common.

"Larxene..."

"Hey, Pooh Bear."

"Don't call me that." Arms rigid at her sides and mouth scrunched up into a pout, Kairi looked the picture-perfect definition of defiance. But one look at Larxene's eyes was enough to make it wither away and die. Once again she was defenseless, just like always. And once again she wished she hadn't said anything, for Larxene simply gave her a half smile, a joking smile. She turned to look back out across the overpass. "I'm sorry," Kairi said quietly. Lamely.

"It's okay."

Biting her bottom lip, Kairi moved to sit next to Larxene, but the other girl shook her head firmly and held out her arm to hold Kairi back, saying very slowly and very quietly, "Don't sit here. It's not safe for you." And so Kairi sat, her back against the concrete wall that stretched a mere two feet above the asphalt. This way she couldn't see Larxene's face and this way she couldn't be reminded that she'd hurt the girl's feelings only a few moments ago.

"Are you okay?" Kairi asked.

"No," Larxene answered. She was as blunt as ever, only this time she was entirely sober. It was almost a weird and unnatural state for the other girl. Kairi didn't mention it. She simply picked up a small pebble -one of the many scattered along the side of the highway- and held it in her hand.

"It's weird..." Larxene said. "They built this entire highway system, this huge overpass. These tunnels and turns and clovers. And I guess they though a lot of people would use them. ...I guess they thought that with the highway would come the cities and the jobs. And the money." There she stopped. She looked down at the empty road stretched beneath the overpass and she was aware of the empty road stretched left to right around her.

There were no cars and there was no one. No one but two stupid girls on the side of the road, at least.

_"And then the deep dark seaweed called up to the monster, 'There's no one here but us fishes!' The monster, hungry and bloodthirsty, dove madly into the water, eager to sink his teeth into the soft scales of a poor promised fish. But there was nothing but seaweed." Larxene watched her grandmother with wide eyes, enchanted by her voice and her fingers as they brought the yarn up and over, around and around the knitting needle._

"Larxene...?"

"It didn't work, Kairi. _It didn't work_. I've lived here my **entire** life and I've **seen** the roads being built. I **watched** the construction and I **believed** this place would turn into something new." Kairi had to squeeze her eyes shut, root herself to the spot, clench her fist around the pebble in her hand, for she could hear Larxene's voice waver and break and she could feel the tears begin to come as she continued quietly, brokenly, and so very unlike herself.

_"The monster was soon trapped in the seaweed, Larxene. Fooled by the evil tricks that water can play and frightened because he couldn't move, the monster struggled viciously. But he could not break free. The seaweed held on tightly and kept the monster down in the deep, down under the surface. And not knowing what to do and fearing that he would die, the monster started to cry. Great huge sobs that were lost underwater as he began to give up."_

"It's stupid for anyone to ever grow up believing that they'll amount to anything. Or that this _place_ will amount to anything."

"That's not true..."

"**Yes it is**!" Larxene bit down hard on her bottom lip, she tasted the blood and she tasted the salt and she felt the tears sliding down her face freely. She hated herself for it and she hated Kairi for listening to it. "You tell me when you've _ever_ lived here and seen it as a beautiful place! It's _not_. None of it is. This old town background is just a load of _shit_, Kairi, and you know it. _You know it!_"

They fell into silence then, the only sound being that of some distant crickets chirping softly away. The only lights were those of the distant streetlamps and the small flickering sparkle of a firefly here, then there. Kairi released a shaky sigh, she released her death grip on the pebble and saw the red imprint in her palm, no more than a little circle.

With a soft clink, the pebble hit the asphalt and she asked, "...Why were you so afraid of Cloud?"

_"But then there came a small little voice as the world began to grow dark for the monster. The voice told him not to worry, 'You'll be safe with me, it's alright, it's okay.' And the monster, for the first time in his life, was shown kindness. 'I don't understand!' he cried. 'How can you worry and care for me when I'm this horrible ugly thing and when I do so much wrong!' He gnashed his horrible teeth and he fought even more furiously against the seaweed, only becoming more deeply entangled._

"...I don't know." Larxene rubbed at her eyes with the back of her hand, scrubbing furiously to erase all traces of tears that could possibly be found. "I... ...Maybe I..." She closed her eyes. She took a deep breath. The air was clean, for as there were so few cars, there was scarcely any pollution. But the air felt empty then and only filled her lungs halfway.

"Maybe I'm just afraid. That... he's right. I mean... Maybe I just don't want to know that I'm messed up. That my childhood sucked. I mean I already know that, for crying out loud. I pay for it every day of my life. He's just rubbing it in. He's just reminding me of all the crap I wanted to forget."

"...Maybe you're not supposed to forget," Kairi said softly. Her fingers brushed against the familiar little pebble and she regarded it with a small frown. She picked it up in between those fingers against and rolled it along the palm of her hand, over and across the fading imprint it'd left there already.

"What, so I'm supposed to _learn_ from it or something?"

"Maybe. ...Or maybe just accept it. I don't know," Kairi said. "I can't tell you what it is that's wrong in your case. I can't tell you what it is that's wrong with mine. Cloud couldn't even tell us himself. But oddly enough, I'm not even thinking about how crazy this all is. How weird it must seem for us to see this little faerie guy and hear him talk and tell us all this stuff about ourselves. How we have to fix it. It's not _that_ I'm thinking about. I'm trying to think about what it is he could be talking about. ...About what I overlooked."

Larxene, who had been listening silently the whole time, discovered that she had nothing to say. Her throat was a mess because she didn't cry very often. Her vision was off, her balance precarious. One wrong move could send her over the edge, and yet it wasn't that she was thinking about. It wasn't about how supernatural their situation was. It wasn't even about what had gone wrong, where it had gone wrong, and what could be done to fix it.

It was simply about Kairi, the girl sitting behind her. It was about Larxene's realization that this girl did not care for her as a lover or a role model or a sex toy. Kairi was no more than a friend and she did everything possible that a friend could do. And she'd been doing that from the time she first met Larxene.

And right then, it was simply about her luck. How lucky she was to have come so far and fallen so often and still have someone like Kairi at a time like that, at a time like this.

Or perhaps it wasn't luck.

_"'I love you,' said the voice, 'because you are evil. And I will never hate you for that.' The monster could feel the weeds slipping away from his arms and legs, sliding off his hideous claws. He was pulled from the water by small hands, and he opened his ugly eyes to discover that the voice had been a small faerie all along. Hundreds of the small silver creatures were happily flitting about, pulling him from the water and up onto the shore. The faerie who had spoken to him smiled warmly and simply said, 'You'll be okay now.'"_

x x x

Cloud looked up from where he sat, perched in an empty candlestick holder. He watched Leon for a moment, silently studying the quiet human, watching him quietly eat his dinner in his quiet apartment. Cloud waited for his to pause, put down his fork, and take a sip of water.

Then he said, "I think it's working, Leon. I think they're starting to understand."

Leon regarded him with a blank stare over the rim of the glass. He swallowed. He put the glass down. He was quiet for a long time and the silence of the small house ruled with all its own regal splendor before he calmly asked, "Understand what?"

"...So... even you still haven't found it yet, huh?"

"No. I haven't."

"...You won't be able to see me when you do find it, you know." Cloud leaned forward, tiny elbows resting on tiny knees, peering up curiously at Leon as he prodded, "Are you even trying at all?"

x x x

Mr. Tigi sat in the folds of the crisp and overly starched hospital sheets. The hour grew later and later and he closed the small novel he'd held clasped between his two soft, pudgy hands for the last few hours. The only sounds were those were those of the IV beside him, steadily drip-dripping away, a distant squeaking drone of a cart being pushed down the hallway, the slippers of one of the many nurses puttering along behind it, pushing the cart forward.

He was tired, but a slow and steady glance at the room around him brought back a small bit of his old familiar vivacity and he was forced to smile when his eyes fell upon the stack of books at his bedside.

Yuffie had returned that evening, after she'd left the Laund-Dry-Mat-O in the hands of Irvine to close up, bearing a backpack full of books and her whirlwind energy, zipping around the room and performing her usual routine of turning on the TV, bringing her employer up-to-date on the happenings of the world and town around them, prattling on mile a minute, nearly nonstop and nearly incomprehensible. But her worry was endearing and her grudge towards the hospital staff was even more so as they demanded she leave Mr. Tigi come ten o' clock so he could get some rest.

He closed his eyes for a moment and thought. He could feel the presence of him upon Yuffie that evening and Mr. Tigi could rest with ease that night knowing that it was all being taken into consideration and being dealt with as quickly as possible.

For he did not have much time left and he knew this. It was, after all, why he did the things that he did and why he tried so hard...

He opened his eyes slowly and shook his head slowly. Slowly he picked up the novel on his lap and slowly he glanced at the page to find where he'd left off. Slowly his eyes read over the words and slowly his mind reached an understanding. A small, knowing smile tugged at the corner of his mouth before he dog-eared the page and set the book on the bedside table, one hand lingering on its cover, the tube to the IV attached to the wrist.

_Frankenstein_. The story of a man and his creation. The story of the untimely suffering of both man and creation.

Mr. Tigi turned off the bedside lamp and closed his eyes, falling into a deep slumber moments later, lulled towards that steady sleep by the quiet drip-dripping and the unnerving stillness of everything around him.

_"But I am a blasted tree; the bolt has entered my soul; and I felt then that I should survive to exhibit what I shall soon cease to be- a miserable spectacle of wrecked humanity, pitiable to others and intolerable to myself."_

(x) (x) (x)

And My Oh My breaks the 100 page barrier. Yay! (Three more chapters to go. I **will** get this done by the time school ends.) Frankenstein and its quote up there credited to Mary Shelley, naturally. Kinda short chapter here, in comparison with some of the others, at least. But I think the rest are about this length too, except for the last one... Hm. Oh well.


	8. A Regular Tom's Diner

**My Oh My**

'A Regular Tom's Diner'

Yuffie found herself walking around in a daze the next afternoon. She had walked across the street from the dry-cleaners and she had looked in through the darkened windows at the shadowed building. She'd seen her own reflection and for half a second she believed herself to be on the other side of the glass, back where she belonged. With Irvine, somewhere in the back, cursing and falling to pieces over a pile of extra-starched collared shirts. And with Mr. Tigi, somewhere and everywhere, bumbling and mumbling, humming and summing up the day's total profits.

And when she realized that she was now outside the ring and the loop she'd been so oddly comfortable in for so long, Yuffie found herself thrown. And she found herself hurrying down the sidewalk, hands crammed in her pockets, sneakers slapping against the concrete.

_Looks like rain_, she noted absently, her gaze towards the sky, her mind leagues away from it.

Yuffie's battle with her subconscious, for those of you who remember such a thing, still raged on within her. Every moment of every day there was some abstract train of thought straying further and further from coming off as normal and common. She tried to hide it and she tried to fight it, for more than anything else, Yuffie wanted to be considered normal. It was something she been brought up to achieve- this normalcy of hers. It was something that she felt that she would give the world for.

If you give a mouse a cookie, he's going to ask for a glass of milk. If you give the world to the majority, they're going to ask for a glass of your soul and maybe, maybe, maybe a pound of your flesh to top it off with. Where has the Merchant of Traverse gone to now?

She meandered down the sidewalk when she felt like running laps around the people around her, however few and however lazy they were. She kept a straight face when she wanted to split at the seems with senseless joy and she kept her hands to herself when she wanted to embrace the world in bone-crunching glory of her own two arms, encircled by her, enchanted by her, and tied loosely around her little finger.

But maybe it wasn't always that way. In every life there's a critical turning point that alters absolutely everything. The monuments of childish hopes and dreams all must one day come crashing down, and Yuffie had most certainly reached that point. She must have, after all. But things still remained as stubborn as she herself was and the memories and dreams still remained standing.

Perhaps it was that way for all of them.

_Was I sixteen?_ Yuffie was making her way down a random road, dirt kicking up beneath her heels. It fell into her lungs and her throat demanded a good cough or two, but she bottled them up, forcing herself into her thoughts instead. _That's weird. It seems like it was so long ago, but it was just a few years, I guess. When Tifa came around..._

x x x

When Tifa came around, she had come across the exuberant little sack of bones and muscle known more commonly as Yuffie. When Tifa came around, she had looked at Yuffie and she had found her interesting. But when Tifa came around there were others who were interested in her, and as human nature instructed her to do, Tifa followed these admirers blindly. She missed Yuffie's open arms completely and wandered into those of a different sort of crowd.

It wasn't necessarily a bad sort of crowd. Back then, Aerith had been at Yuffie's side and as Aerith said, none of them were truly bad kids, the kids in that crowd. They were wealthy snobs, yes. They seemed more interested in Tifa's cup size rather than her dazzling smile or charming personality. But certainly- _certainly_ that didn't make them bad kids.

Yuffie had thought otherwise. And she'd immediately seen to snubbing Tifa the moment after she caught wind of the other girl's alarming advancement in the social order of high school. Yuffie stuck up her nose, crossed her scrawny arms, and marched determinedly away from the other girl, focusing every ounce of energy on having nothing to do with her.

x x x

The sky was definitely darkening by then and even Yuffie wasn't too far gone to realize it. But she had been too far gone to realize where she was wondering off to. She found herself on the bank of the creek that ran through the far side of town, across the shallow waters from the old mill. That ancient old place that Naminé saw to caring for. The spooky haunting where she'd first seen Cloud.

Yes, the place where she'd first started doubting her sanity.

She walked towards the crumbly old dirt path and found her feet taking her towards the front door. It looked old and lonely, the mill in the woods. Someone had taken a spoon and pulled out all its guts long ago, leaving nothing but a thick and empty shell that no one really seemed to love. No one except Naminé, perhaps.

Yuffie padded quietly over towards the front window next to the door, a cute little window seat jutting out from the siding. Nothing could be seen except for blackness and very faint shadows playing across the hardwood floor that glinted dully in the moonlight. Nothing, nothing... Of course it was nothing. Through the window could be seen the small card table Naminé had set up. A mound of cleaning supplies stacked up on top of it. A mop in a corner and a vacuum beside that.

What was I expecting after all?

But Yuffie had been expecting something. And though she would never admit it to herself or to anyone else, as a small glimmer of light caused her attention to snap towards a far corner of the wall inside, she knew her expectation had been confirmed.

And as more and more of the flickering light became visible, Yuffie could only stare in shock as the floated and drifted lazily towards the window. Right where she stood.

x x x

It had been a day like any other day. Or so it had seemed. History had been a bore, just as it usually was. Her trig class had been way over her head, just as it usually was. And her gym class, her final class of that day, had involved Yuffie's face serving as a nice catcher's mitt for their session of softball. It really was a wonder she hadn't broken her nose.

That was how Yuffie had come to be standing in the girls' locker room, tugging her shirt over her head cautiously, trying not to displace the wad of paper towels she'd crammed in her nose to stop up the bleeding. She was trying to ignore the giggles and stares of the girls around her and she was trying to pretend not to notice as Tifa walked by with a clucking little group of her friends.

In a world where Yuffie tried so hard to do so many things, she was never very successful at accomplishing any of them.

The bell rang, the girls left. Yuffie crammed her gym uniform in her locker and closed with an oh-so-satisfying bang. She jammed on her headphones, she jabbed the play button with her little finger, and with as much attitude as she could muster with tissues stuck up her nose, Yuffie spun on her heel to leave the locker room.

And she promptly let out a shriek of surprise as she found herself walking straight into Tifa. Or rather, Tifa's breasts. The girl was significantly taller than Yuffie. Then again, most people were back then.

"Um..." The other girl flushed and backed up quickly, one hand held up almost as though she'd been in the process of warning Yuffie as she'd spun right into her. Warning, shmarning. Or something.

Yuffie was roughly as pink as nice little Crayola crayon as she clutched her CD player defensively to her own (and still considerably smaller) chest, looking ready to pounce and defend herself in a whirling storm of skin and bones should the need arise. But after a moment of awkward silence between them in which both of them did nothing but lamely stare at each other, Tifa finally said.

"Um... hey there."

Yuffie didn't respond. She could see Tifa's mouth moving, but couldn't for the life of her make out what she was saying over her... Oh. Right. The music.

Turning off her CD player, Yuffie tugged the headphones off. "What was that?"

"I just said hi."

"Oh. Hi."

"Did... you hear the announcements for today?" Tifa asked. She didn't seem half as skittish as she had moments ago. In fact, she looked more in charge than ever before. Or maybe that was just from Yuffie's perspective.

"No. I don't listen to them."

"Oh." She was about to cast a look that said, _Well why not, for crying out loud?_ but thankfully thought better of it. Instead she simply stated, "They said they were having their first GSA meeting today."

"...So what?"

"Do you know what a GSA is?"

Yuffie rolled her eyes and stuck her scrawny hands on her scrawny hips, smirking wickedly and saying, "Of course I do. Duh. It's the _Gay-Straight Alliance_." Once again she was in the green, apparently knowing something Tifa did not. Damn that felt good.

"Ohhh. I see." Tifa offered her a small smile and pushed her long ponytail over her shoulder. She wore a tight blue tank top with a small black skirt, white stockings and trendy black boots that only made her taller. Her eyes were lined with thick, but beautifully applied eyeliner, shadowed with blue and all centered to her dark eyes which, at that particular moment, were sparkling happily as she asked, "You want to go to the meeting with me?"

"Why would I wanna go with **you**?"

"I don't know. Were you planning on going?"

Yuffie thought quickly. If she said no, she might come across as being uncool. That is, if going to GSA meetings was the, uh, cool thing to do. _Is it? Wait, I don't care!_ But if she said yes, Tifa might think she was gay. Then she'd tell everyone and they'd laugh her out of the school.

Hmm. It appeared to be a lose-lose situation.

"...Of course I was planning on going. 'Til you bumped into me."

Tifa smiled and giggled, not bothering to point out that it had actually been Yuffie who had bumped into her. "Sorry then. I didn't mean to get in the way. Mind if I walk with you there?"

Yuffie snorted. "Do whatever you want."

And so Tifa did.

It turned out that attending GSA meetings was not, in fact, the cool thing to do. Yuffie would later come to understand that that had been the whole reason Tifa had wanted to go with Yuffie in the first place. No one in her crowd knew of Tifa's secret attendance to the meetings, and outside of those meetings everything between Tifa and Yuffie was... well. Nothing. Tifa never said 'hello' to her in the hallway and Yuffie never tried to get her attention. They never sat at the same lunch table and they never even asked one another for homework assignments from the classes they shared.

Yet there was a silent agreement between the two of them to attend the GSA meetings. There were only ten or so students who regularly showed up, three or four who showed up from time to time. All seemed quiet at first, guarded and shy. It seemed as though they were terrified of being there, yet all pulled together by one similar force.

It went on like that for a year. And it seemed, to both girls, like it was a thing that would go on forever, as long as they remained safe and secure in their high school years.

But the following year, something happened to change it.

Every year the school had a homecoming parade. Floats were made, instruments tuned, and the school's clubs were lined up. The band led the way, the homecoming court following suit, and the clubs and organizations wrapping up the event in the back. The GSA was one of the many clubs attending the parade, their banner rolled up and set on the grass, their few members scattered around them, quiet, anxious, and rather nervous.

But Yuffie found some consolation in the fact that they were all there together. All of them... but one.

"Where's Tifa?" she'd asked, looking curiously towards the woman sponsoring the club. The teacher shot her an apologetic smile and simply told her the truth. She didn't no. Apparently, no one did.

Yuffie had waited and stalled as long as possible that afternoon, trying to hold up the parade as long as possible, so certain that Tifa was just running a little late. _She'll be right here, I just know it. Her mom or someone'll drive around the bend and she'll run out of the car and say she's sorry. But it'll be okay 'cause Tifa's coming. She just a little late, she's just a little late..._

But as is always the case, one girl couldn't hold back the storm of a high school parade. Yuffie was swept up and along with the rest of the GSA kids as they unrolled their banner and stretched it out between themselves, just as all of the rest of the clubs did with their similar signs and posters. It wasn't much, but it was something. Traverse High Gay-Straight Alliance.

_It wasn't much, but it was something._

And something was all it took to get the bystanders riled up. Curious glances were shot at the banner and the teenagers holding it up. Parents narrowed their eyes, they pulled their children towards them. But Yuffie never saw it. She never picked up on it and it had never even dawned on her that such a club would cause anyone in their tiny little backwater community to be upset.

She'd been so oblivious.

But no matter how oblivious she had been, nothing could have prepared Yuffie for the rock that was thrown, that hit one of the boys beside her helping to hold the banner. Nothing could prepare her for the laughter and the whooping and the small trickle of blood that ran down his temple as he simply gritted his teeth and looked straight ahead, determined to ignore it.

But she saw the tears stinging his eyes and she angrily looked to see where the stone had come from.

And she found Tifa, standing amidst her circle of friends, laughing and jeering with the rest of them.

She met Yuffie's eyes for only a split second. And perhaps, for that very split second, she actually did look quite sorry. But it only lasted for one second. And then it was gone.

x x x

Crouched in front of the window, Yuffie watched with silent amazement as a small girl, no taller than the length of her index finger and possibly just as skinny, perched on the window sill. All that stood between them was a thin plane of glass as Yuffie gaped wide-eyed at the tiny figure.

_She's just like Cloud_, she stupidly realized.

And sure enough, both of them looked to be of the same build. Much like Cloud's elegant butterfly wings sprouted from the middle of his back, this girl seemed to have the same sort of pair, though hers full of warmer and softer hues. The wings open and closed ever so slowly, almost as though they were beating with a mind of their own, naturally in time with the breath of the girl who owned them.

The girl smiled sweetly. She raised a thumbnail-sized hand to the glass and gently rested it upon the surface. Clearly fascinated by this, Yuffie curiously raised her index finger and laid to rest opposite of hers, the each staring fixedly at the other throughout the whole interaction.

She's beautiful, Yuffie thought. I've never seen anyone who looks so...

Really, there probably were no words. Clad in the same sort of random patchwork attire as Cloud (some light and gauzy white material-- probably the remains of an old lacey curtain and three pink pony beads threaded through a piece of yarn as a belt) and with her light brown hair pulled back into a trailing braid, she looked every ounce like some sort of bizarre character straight from _The Borrowers_.

...Granted, it was difficult for her to look 'every ounce' like one, seeing as not a great deal of ounces went into making her. But it certainly helped that her plait of braided hair was neatly held in place by a short strand of dental floss.

Yuffie licked her lips and waited expectantly. She stared onwards, intrigued by the soft glowing light that seemed to fall from the faerie in gentle waves. There were more in the background, in the blackness of the house. They emitted the exact same light that this little girl faerie did. And they emitted the exact same light that Cloud had when Yuffie had seen him for the very first time.

_I wonder why he wasn't glowing like this when I saw him last time... Is he sick...?_

x x x

Yuffie spoke to Tifa one last time on a rainy May day. She had stayed after school to make up a Trigonometry test she'd missed and was waiting for the bus ride home when Tifa silently sat down at the other end of the bench.

It was almost as though they were strangers.

The thoughts began to creep up, slowly but surely. Questions Yuffie had bottled up and stowed away, given up for being gone. Why had Tifa done it? Why couldn't she stand up for herself?

And so, perfectly naive in every way, Yuffie asked her this. She turned her head slightly and was dimly aware of the slow and sluggish rain drops falling lazily against her head. She was aware of the dampness in the air and the smell of raw earth. And yes, she was aware of the only other occupant on the bench, seated rigidly on the other end, eyes narrowed and back straight as a board.

"You don't understand."

"Oh come off it already! What isn't there to understand? You stabbed me in the back- end of story! I think I understand the whole thing just-"

"No, you **don't** understand, Yuffie. You don't _know_ what it's like. You can't possibly understand because you are _not_ me. You may not be a lesbian and you may not even be bisexual. I don't know _what_ you are, but I know that you can't possibly understand what I'm going through." Tifa's gaze grew cold and she drew her arms in, clutching her school books protectively to her chest.

She was positively glaring at Yuffie and Yuffie could feel her own resolve crumbling rapidly beneath her feet as Tifa continued on bitterly.

"You don't feel like someone's stabbing you with a knife every time they call one another fucking _dykes_ or _faggots_ in the hallway. They joke about it and they laugh about it. You don't have people telling you that God hates you, you don't have them waving signs and banners and saying you deserve to be _dead_ just because of one thing, one stupid little thing that is part of the way you're programmed inside."

The way Tifa spat her words out reminded Yuffie of some gun spitting bullets, pathetically and stupidly, like it knew of nothing else it could do than frantically shooting in every direction and trying to hit something in the blackness of it all.

"You do **not** understand, Yuffie. Don't pretend you do."

_Yeah? Well maybe I only went with you to the stupid meetings because I trusted you! Did that ever cross your mind? That maybe I don't know what I am either? I didn't know then and I still don't know now! I was just a stupid kid, Tifa. I was just a stupid kid and you were the cool sort of girl who I wanted to hang around with. _

Yuffie didn't know what to say. In reality, she had never known what to say to her. Yuffie had made up for it by saying everything, closing her eyes, crossing her fingers, and hoping that she said something she was really meant to say. She had spent a year trying to find herself and trying to find the words. But it didn't matter.

It really just didn't matter. Even if Yuffie had been able to understand... even if maybe it would have just taken her some time... Tifa was not willing to give it to her. She had plainly stated what she believed to be true. Yuffie did not understand. It was burned into Yuffie's mind that she did not understand. That she had nothing in common with the band of kids who sat so quietly and so nervously in that one silent room. Those kids who were teased and abused because nature made them one way and not another.

_I have nothing in common with them, I am not one of them, I hate them, I hate them, I hate them..._

And so, misunderstood and burning with the embarrassment of being such a fool, Yuffie began to scream.

"I _hate_ you!"

_I would have followed you to any club you wanted to go to... It was high school and we were all stupid kids._

"I fucking _hate_ you!"

_But you, Tifa, were the stupidest of all, I think. You went on and on about how I didn't understand you and how I was dumb to think I could ever understand what you were going through. ...But we're all in the same sort of boat, really. You just chose to run yours ashore and drown everything about you. That's the only difference between us._

_You're the type of person who gives up and drowns on the inside like that._

_I'm the type of person who will always come paddling on home. Even if it takes all night._

x x x

"You can see me."

"...Yeah." Yuffie swallowed nervously and bit her bottom lip. "I can."

"But why? You seem so old."

"I'm not really old. ...A friend of yours told me so."

"You mean Cloud?"

"Yeah."

"...What is your name?"

"Yuffie."

"...Yuffie..." She traced the outline of Yuffie's finger pressed against the glass. She smiled sadly and spoke quite slowly. She did not seem to understand much of anything. Or it simply may have been that the two of them were on different planes of thinking altogether.

"Sometimes, Yuffie, the only way we can survive is by forgiving ourselves. I believe that you forgave her long ago, but in doing so, forgot to do the same for yourself. Only adults are so selfish. Are you really so young? You're growing old so young and staying young so old. You're all mixed up, aren't you?"

Yuffie swallowed again and tried to nod her head, but discovered she couldn't move.

The faerie nodded again, staring dead on at Yuffie as she finally said, "You need to learn, Yuffie. You understand. You just need to learn."

It was the last time Yuffie ever saw the other faerie. Later she would wonder if it was just a dream. But for what it was worth, it felt real. It did not look real and it certainly did not seem real within her brain. But it was something much deeper than that which struck a resounding chord and assured Yuffie of one very simple fact.

_All_ of it was real.

x x x

After that day, Yuffie found herself doing a whole lot of thinking. Her magical little subconscious was having a field day working up the rest of her mind and shoving it into overdrive quite gleefully, laughing all the way to the mental bank. It went something like that, at any rate. So Yuffie was not at all surprised to discover that some part of herself, and a very large part at that, had come to a certain conclusion.

If she was, in fact, attracted to girls, she might as well be attracted to Kairi, right? It seemed that Kairi already was attracted to her, so that easily eliminated a huge chunk of the problem. She knew that Kairi was gay herself, she knew that the other girl was no involved in any sort of relationship, and most importantly, she was relatively certain of the fact that Kairi was just a nice girl overall.

...Plus, she had a really cute mouth.

At any rate, Yuffie came to this conclusion and found that for once in her life, she was going to act on it. She was determined to do so and she had set off out of her apartment to hunt down Kairi. ...Yes, she'd tried to hunt down Kairi... countless times, in fact. But the other girl was nowhere to be found.

It was as though she had dropped off the face of the earth entirely.

Yuffie pondered all this as she sat in one of the town's few diners, situation on a lonely corner of a rather barren street. She knew that The Emporium was just down the street and around the bend. She knew that the nail salon Kairi worked at was only a block or so away, the local real estate agency somewhere around there. And yet no matter how close she was to these places and to these people, Yuffie still suddenly felt horribly and inescapably alone.

The waiter came by to refill her little mug of coffee, but only poured about half a cup's worth before he was distracted. Yuffie glanced up, about to tell the waiter off for being as irresponsible asshole, but saw that the source of his distraction was no more than his girlfriend, popping in from the rain to the shelter of the diner, shaking off her umbrella gently and shooting the boy across the counter a bright and cheerful grin.

Never before had Yuffie felt quite as jealous as she did right then.

So she stifled the feeling, stifled her nasty comments for the damn waiter. She stifled it all and reached for the creamer seated in the middle of the countertop and drowned her coffee in creamy goodness. So there, she thought bitterly.

Her attention drifted in and out, finally landing on the newspaper lying on the stool next to her. Someone must have forgotten it, she figured. She glanced around for a moment before picking it up. Before lazily leafing through it, a bored expression scrawled across her face as she did so.

_Don't they have any comics in these things anymore?_

Flipping through the paper, Yuffie breezed past the horoscopes. _Libra- Lost in a world that moves too fast or too slow, you're feeling confused. Don't push your friends away during this time when you need them most. Only you can find the answer, but it's a long and lonely road ahead._

_What a load of bullshit_, Yuffie thought.

But it was at that moment that Yuffie felt that strange prickly sensation picking up on the back of her neck. That weird feeling that comes from being watched. Yuffie shoved the paper away. She glanced left, she glanced right. ...Everyone seemed very caught up in their mediocre meals and conversation. ...So then just who the hell was spying on her?

_Kairi!_

Kairi was there, right outside the oversized window of the diner. The dismal gray weather hung around her, but stayed away all at the same time. Nothing would dare to touch her because she was Kairi, of course, and rain just simply wasn't allowed to lay its filthy hands on her.

She stood there then, looking into the diner. ...Or at least, it seemed like she was looking in. Yuffie had been almost certain that the other girl had been looking at her, but after a split second, Yuffie corrected herself. Kairi wasn't looking at Yuffie. Kairi was looking at her own reflection in the window, a somewhat puzzled expression on her face as she paused and lifted her fingers to brush a stray strand of hair out of her face.

Kairi shook her head just so slightly and bent down to straighten one of her socks. Yuffie averted her gaze, mentally kicking herself for trying to stare in the first place. The last thing she was about to do was to be caught drooling like a rapid ape when all Kairi was trying to do was fix her sock. ...But...

When Yuffie looked up, Kairi was gone.

..._Crap!_

Yuffie bolted from her stool by the counter leaving her coffee unfinished and unpaid for, but the waiter didn't seem to notice. He was still too busy talking up his girlfriend.

Without a second thought, Yuffie hurriedly looked around cursing her own stupidity and trying to figure out where the hell Kairi could've disappeared to so quickly. There! A streak of red hair somewhere over by... over by the entrance to the park! Kairi was cutting through the park! _Hurry! To the Batmobile!_

Changing her tune to curse her stupid brain, Yuffie dashed madly down the sidewalk, raced across the street and plowed into the park, sneakers hitting the slick concrete with slippery squeaks and thuds. She was getting really out of shape and she cursed herself for that too. _Man, why am I such an idiot all the time!_

"Hey!" Kairi's shoulder quite visibly tensed, but she didn't respond other than that. If anything she just walked a little faster, arms swinging at her sides, skinny legs hurrying to keep up with the pace she demanded of them as Yuffie shouted again, "Hey, Kairi, hold up!" ...And still nothing. "Kairi!"

Finally Yuffie began to catch up. Maybe she wasn't quite as out-of-shape as she'd thought. "Listen..." she started.

"I'm sorry, but I have somewhere I have to be going right now..."

"Please?"

"...Go away, Yuffie..."

"Don't be stubborn now."

"..." Kairi said nothing.

"Aww, Kai, sheesh."

Letting out an exasperated sigh, Kairi flung up her hands and drew to a sudden halt, nearly catching Yuffie off guard when she rolled her eyes and said, "Well what is it then?"

Well now that she had Kairi, what exactly was it that Yuffie wanted to say? _Damn_. She figured she'd improvise and hope she'd be hit by a divine inspiration in the midst of it.

"...Um... you remember that time you... er, I mean, _I_ called you?"

"...Yeah, so?"

"And we were listening to that song."

"Mmhm. The Postal Service. Brand New Colony. What about it?"

What Yuffie wanted to say was completely different from what she actually did say. What she **wanted** to say was this:

_I heard this song by this other band. You know. Some weird band. Called The Flaming Lips, or whatever. It was called 'Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots.' And you know, I heard that song and I didn't think about it or anything. But now I know you and now I think, 'That's totally you in that song.' You're Yoshimi, you know? The song... it's like, this one guitar..._

_ You know. _

_ And then this guy sings about Yoshimi- 'Oh Yoshimi, they don't believe me, but you won't let those robots eat me.' The song's about Yoshimi... I mean, duh it's about Yoshimi. She fights pink robots and all. But... you know. In the real world, Kairi, you're fighting giant pink robots all the time! And no one's ever told you that before and no one ever will- I'm the only person who will ever tell you about these pink robots you're fighting for me._

_ But you're fighting 'em. And you're fighting 'em every day of your whole damn life because you're that good. You're just that damn good, you know?_

There was Yuffie, letting her stifled brain run off with her again. She was standing there with what she thought must have been the most idiotic expression on her face, eyes wide and mouth hanging sort of open and everything. Kairi was looking at her expectantly, the look on her face clearly asking her where the hell she was going with all this.

Yuffie had the words- she had them right there, all scripted out for her, thanks to her subconscious at work. But...

Though Yuffie now knew what she wanted to say, she inwardly kicked herself as she lamely spat out, "Don't you think it's weird, I mean? The exact same freaking song at the exact same freaking moment. ...The freaking faeries and this whole crazy other-worldly stuff going on. I mean, you _have_ to think it's weird."

Kairi gave Yuffie a small look and Yuffie herself didn't quite understand what it meant. Was it one of curiosity or a look that said something more along the lines of 'Man, you really are as dumb as a fencepost, aren't you?' She didn't know and she didn't dare ask. She simply waited for Kairi to respond.

And respond Kairi did. She smiled, tucked her arms behind her back, and said, "I remember a while back, when it all first began to start happening, I kept waking up each morning and thinking it was all a dream. But nope. I was still there on Larxene's floor." Kairi laughed at that before simply nodding once and saying, "Cloud is real, Yuffie."

"...I know. I didn't think so when I first saw him, but... now I know. Other people see him too and..." Yuffie trailed off, feeling stupid and awkward.

"'And I don't feel so alone and crazy knowing that.' Something like that, right?" Kairi grinned at Yuffie. Yuffie managed a small, nervous smile back.

_Why the hell am I so afraid of her?_

"Yeah, something like that," Yuffie said. "Do... do you know what he was talking about? When he said each one of us was...flawed or... missing something?"

"Do you mean have I figured it out?"

"...Yeah..."

"...I... don't think so. Not yet. I don't know where to start. Everyone always says how short life really is, but from here it just seems so long. I don't even _know_ where to start... And I don't even know if there's anything I can do to change it."

"That's just it though. What if there's nothing we can do? Why are we all so messed up?"

"Come on, do you really think I know?" Kairi asked jokingly as she rolled her eyes and shot Yuffie a little smirk. The two of them came to a halt in the park as Kairi cocked her head to the side and seemed to think her words over for a moment before saying, "I believe in Cloud, Yuffie. I know everyone else might not, but I do. I don't think we're all hallucinating and it doesn't feel like a dream. I know it's real now. I have to do something. I have to at least try."

Silence followed. Yuffie didn't know what to say. She didn't know if she should tell Kairi about the other faerie she'd seen in the old mill Naminé took care of. She didn't know if she should tell her how strange the other faerie had seemed, how different from Cloud she was. She didn't know where her thoughts were leading her, and for that matter, she didn't know where her emotions were leading her either.

But finally Yuffie bit her bottom lip. She looked around. She stuffed her hands in her pockets.

"You wanna keep walking?"

"Sure."

They walked like that, side by side, for half an hour. Neither knew quite where they were going and neither seemed to care. Kairi's hands were in her pockets, Yuffie's hands were clasped behind her head. Neither tried to touch the other and neither tried to speak a word.

No one ever wants to be the one to break the ice.

Because the one who breaks the ice is always the one who falls in first.

x x x

Cloud spent his days perched on Leon's shoulder, looking out on the human world with a great deal of interest. He never failed to be intrigued by how they all went about their daily lives with such devotion and always seemed to have such a purpose in everything they did. Granted, Cloud didn't quite understand half the things they did in the first place, but...

He didn't even have any idea what exactly it was that Leon and Larxene sold in Axel's little shop of his, either.

"Leon, what's this?"

"Cloud, don't sit on that, please."

"Larxene, I don't get it. What's this thing supposed to do?"

"Well you see, you strap that thing on around your-"

"Larxene!"

"What? He asked, didn't he? For crying out loud, Leon, I'm sure faeries have sex too!"

"...Leon?"

"What."

"What's sex?"

It helped Cloud's case that none of the customers who trickled into the store could see him. Several of them were disturbed by something rustling around in the box of condoms, but most of them forced themselves to overlook it and assumed they were suffering from one of three things. Either they hadn't gotten enough sleep, they hadn't eaten enough for breakfast, or they were all higher than a kite at the time, in which case, seeing a shifty-looking box of condoms was the least of their worries.

But yes, Cloud was quite happy living with Leon. It was much better, he figured, than staying locked up in that old mill all day with no one to talk to other than Naminé, during her occasional visits to go about her job there. ...Well... there had always been the others, but...

"Cloud, where are you?"

"In here!"

"Get out of there already! You're freaking people out!"

"Sorry!"

But... they weren't really like him. Cloud had never really figured out why, even to that day. Ever since he'd left them, they'd become more like lifeless puppets than anything else. They didn't eat, they didn't sleep. And they never, ever cried. _I sleep and I eat_, Cloud thought to himself. But when he came to the third object of concern, he had to admit a drawn blank.

_I don't think I've ever cried though... Even when he left. I just felt more empty than anything else. Empty... and a little betrayed, I guess._

As Leon closed up shop for the day and began to make his way home, Cloud slowly began to have a bit of a revolution inside his tiny body. It was not the same wave of emotion that Kairi had experienced. It was not the strange swaying, the swinging back and forth from one side to the other that Yuffie seemed to be going through. It seemed as though it was different for everyone, and for Cloud it just happened to be slow and steady, an almost pleasant thing that began to dawn upon him.

It was Cloud's first experience with that sort of emotion and it hit him harder than anything he'd ever known. Nothing in his heart or brain could comprehend what it was rushing through him right then, why it felt so otherworldly to him and why his body felt like it was stretching in all directions. For a second, he even had visions of his tiny little body exploding into a thousand little pieces.

But... That wasn't it.

_I don't understand..._

It was a sudden desire to stay with Leon, as cold and as silent as he could be. He was different from any human that Cloud had ever known, and though he'd never really had a wide selection of humans to deal with, Leon was... special. ...For lack of a better word. Cloud really didn't have to vocabulary to support him, honestly.

And so his mind put it all into terms he could understand, as simple as they were and as bland as they seemed.

_He looks so sad... But... I feel like I have to make him happy. I don't know why, but I just want so badly to see him smile or something. I don't know!_

It was the desire to take both hands, however small they were, and hold the world in his palms for Leon and say to him, "Here you go, you can have it, it's all yours." And Cloud regarded the silent shaggy haired wonder in such a way that it made him begin to doubt both himself and his creator.

For the first time ever, Cloud wanted to be selfish. Cloud did not want to let Leon go.

"Leon..."

"Hn?"

"...Um... n-nevermind."

x x x

Yuffie would have scrawled her love for all to see across the walls, but she feared that she'd only go blind from it in the end. Or worse, it would all be nothing but a scramble of foreign symbols to her. She had come crashing into reality with such a jolt that it left her standing and reeling in her living room, wondering just where the hell she was.

Tifa, it seemed, was right all along.

Yuffie did not understand. She didn't understand anyone else and she didn't understand herself. She never had and perhaps she never would be able to. The very thought caused poor Yuffie to plunk rather lifelessly onto the nearest object that she assumed would support her weight.

It just happened to be a cardboard box.

...And it just happened to be _un_able to support her weight.

That was how Yuffie found herself with tears building up in her eyes for the first time in years. _My eyes are drowning! Bail them out!_ She blinked crazily and scrambled to reach for the phone on the end table beside her, but only succeeded in tipping her cardboard prison over in the process.

And _that_ was how Yuffie came to call Larxene's apartment, wedged sideways in a tipped-over cardboard box in her living room.

"Hello?"

"...Larxene?"

"Uh huh. And this would be?"

"It's Yuffie."

"Ahh, my dear friend Ducky. How's it going? Come to terms with your sexuality yet? I've got a certain little redhead here whose sex drive is absolutely _plummeting_, let me tell- _Shit_, Kairi, that fucking _hurt_!" There was a loud clatter on Larxene's end of the phone, several curses on Larxene's part and a yowl from Kairi that went something like "Give me the _phone_, Larxene!"

Finally, Yuffie heard Kairi's breathless "Hello?" and took a gulp of fresh air herself. It was now or never.

"Um... yeah. Hi Kairi. Listen, I'm just going to keep talking and you can cut me off whenever you feel like it because really, when I say I'm going to keep talking, I actually do mean that I'm going to keep talking. Or if you just want to hang up the phone right now, well that's fine too. But I think that I should just say whatever it is that I think I'm trying to say right now and get it over with because... um, just because I think that it'd be good for me. Like... I think I sort of have to do it.

"I'm not mad at you for kissing me. I just wanted to let you know. I really didn't mind it at all and actually... well, I mean, you know how I've sort of been a homophobic bitch all along? Yeah, well, this might sound a little crazy after all that, but I don't know if I'm really homophobic. Like, I don't even think I really know much about myself at all. So me saying I'm homophobic is really pretty much a shot in the dark for me.

"I can't say I'm straight either. And I can't say I'm a lesbian. I can't even say I'm bisexual because I'm just _that_ confused. I don't know what I am and it's... um... well, it's just frustrating me. The few things I do know don't add up to anything that I think really resembles me, but as I've already told you, I have almost no hold at all on who I think I am. Maybe I'm not even much of a person or something, maybe I'm just more of a body, I guess. I don't know. That sounded depressing.

"I'm not depressed, I'm just confused. I'm not mad at you and I never was. I've just always been... well, just like I said. I've always been confused. And it's really no better now than it was when I was a stupid bumbling kid in high school. I don't know if I like girls or guys. I don't know if I like both. I could be _asexua_l and I probably wouldn't even know that either. But what I'm trying to say... I mean... you know. The whole reason I called and the whole reason I've been trying to explain for the last, like... three minutes...

"I really like you. I like being around you and I like talking to you. I like seeing you smile and to be absolutely blunt and perfectly honest, I like looking at you, too. ...That came out sounding really lame, so if you could pretend I never said it, that would be great. But... I don't know if liking you means like... you know. Liking you in a girlfriend sort of way. So I'm not asking you out! ...I didn't mean for that to sound so mean...

"Dammit... um... listen, what I'm trying to get at here is that I do like you. I know I like you in a perfectly platonic way at the very least, I mean. I at least know that much. That's sorta one of the few things I really _do_ know. So... I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do. If that means I'm supposed to hang out with you more or figure out just exactly what extent my liking goes... I seriously have no idea. Clearly I'm an absolute idiot and haven't the slightest clue what I'm doing. But if it's okay, I would really, really like to go on a sort of semi-not-real-sort-of-just-kind-of-friends-or-something date with you."

On the other end of the line, Kairi was smiling so brightly, Larxene thought that she would go absolutely blind. The auburn hair girl nodded and grinned, grinned and nodded, and even though Yuffie couldn't possibly see it, Kairi somehow hoped that her own elation could be conveyed in her words "Of course, Yuffie."

"...Phew. Man. Okay. Well _that's_ a relief. I thought you'd think I was insane or something."

"I'd never think that!"

"Well thanks. But can I ask you a favor?"

"Sure, anything!"

"...Can you come over here?"

"Um... Yuffie?"

"No, no, no. Nothing like that. I'm just stuck, is all."

"...You're stuck?"

"Yeah, well, it's a bit of a long story."

x x x

Later that evening, Mr. Tigi was wheeled into an operation room and put under anesthesia. Leon didn't notice how deeply Cloud slept in his soap dish beside his bed.

But Leon did sit and stare out the window. And he did wonder.

(x) (x) (x)

Sorry for the huge delay. Vacations and sudden school duties eat my soul alive. ...Dammit, what chapter are we on? Ah right. Eight. Two more chapters to go after this. ...This chapter was definitely not supposed to be so long and Yuffie-centered. Oops.


	9. The Farewell Symphony

**My Oh My**

'The Farewell Symphony'

The Emporium was having a slow day.

That was to be expected, really, because in a relatively small community full of relatively old people relaxing in the glory of their retirement, there wasn't much market for kinky sex toys. In fact, the only way they managed to stay in business was by selling products to teenagers, something which really lit the local parents on fire. Figuratively speaking, of course. ..._Of course._

At any rate, Larxene was her normal cheerful self, unloading boxes and various plastic-wrapped goodies from a large cardboard box, tossing them onto shelves and scowling all the while.

Leon sat behind the counter and talked philosophy with a faerie.

"So his name was... _So-crates_?"

"No, no, not So-crates. It's pronounced _Sah-cruh-teeze_."

"Are you sure?"

"More or less."

No one present in the room had expected the little bell to ring cheerfully. And certainly no one had expected for Yuffie to stride confidently up to Larxene, clear her throat, place her hands on her hips and ask...

"Larxene, have you ever kissed girls?"

Larxene looked up. She blinked. And very slowly she said, "If this is some pathetic excuse to make out with me, I hope you realize that you're going to get a black eye."

"No! Eww! Get real! I... I need to know what I'm supposed to do with Kairi..."

"...Kissing girls is easier than kissing guys. They're just like you. Do what _you_ like." Larxene narrowed her eyes and rose from where she had been crouched in front of the shelves, juggling her cardboard boxes in her arms and headed towards the back room. Determined, Yuffie followed, gritting her teeth and balling her fists and praying that this would pay off.

"Well I don't know what she likes. Everyone likes different things. Isn't there some... universally good lesbian thing to do?"

"No!"

"...What the hell's wrong with _you_?"

"Fuck off!"

Slam.

Yuffie stared confusedly at the closed door, the ripped-out piece of notebook paper quite simply stating that what lay beyond was not only just for employee's only, but it would also be detrimental to one's physical and mental health to risk walking in there without due reason.

"Hey Leon...?" Yuffie started.

Behind the counter, Leon shrugged and raised one eyebrow at the hopeful looking girl standing in the middle of the story. "Don't ask me," he said blandly. "Why not try Cloud?"

"Eh? He's here? Where is he?"

The aforementioned faerie glanced up from his current perch on Leon's shoulder and cocked his head to the side slightly. "...Yuffie?"

When Yuffie just continued looking cluelessly around for Cloud, Leon shot her his own expectant look which was simply received by a defensive, "What?"

"Cloud. Obviously."

"Where?"

"Right here. Are you..." And then it hit him. "Yuffie... on my shoulder... you can't see him?"

Yuffie placed her hands on her hips angrily and huffed, "Of course not! There's nothing on your... Oh." Blink. Stare. "Holy..."

And although Yuffie couldn't see it and Leon couldn't feel it, Cloud began to tremble. And he began to grow so terrified that he wondered if he would ever feel safe again. For it is a scary thing to doubt your own existence. And it's an even scarier thing to realize that the world and its inhabitants are better off believing you never existed to begin with.

x x x

That evening, Leon's apartment was quiet. Leon had been reading some book that he hadn't even been interested in at all since he got home from work. He was trying his hardest to avoid speaking with the little faerie flitting around him because he was well aware of the intense look with which Cloud was regarding him.

Granted, Leon didn't have the slightest clue what was on the mind of the little guy, but he wasn't about to start asking, either.

He could hear a distant, quiet clatter somewhere across the room. One glance away from the text of the page told him Cloud was just playing in the bowl Leon kept by the apartment door, holding his keys and spare change. He shook his head, he turned back to the page and he realized he had no idea where he was. He'd stopped reading about ten pages ago. Damn.

"A penny for your thoughts?"

Leon raised one eyebrow and looked up again.

There was Cloud, flapping his wings furiously as he tried to get a good grip on the penny he carried in his arms, screwing up his face in the process and huffing and puffing with all the effort it took to carry the stupid thing across the room. If Leon was anyone but Leon, he would've burst out laughing, for sure.

Cloud simply smiled innocently, though it wasn't without a trace of pride that came from the joy of using one of the little human-coined (certainly no pun intended) phrases he'd picked up along his way. He had hoped that it would make Leon smile, chuckle, maybe open up to him a bit more for Cloud was indeed a very lonely little faerie and he enjoyed Leon's company for reasons that he just couldn't explain.

He didn't have the words to do so, nor did he have the knowledge and the emotion to pin together. It was something completely beyond his understanding and completely beyond the realm of his own little imagination.

Leon closed his book, sliding a leaf of old notebook paper between the pages to keep his place, watching with only the smallest amount of interest as Cloud came to perch upon his bent knee, the penny still clutched in between his arms and his small chest, though much of its tiny weight resting on Leon now, instead.

They began to talk, quietly and softly as they sometimes did. It was a sort of talk that Leon rarely had- had _never_ had throughout his childhood and into the difficult times in his life. It was the sort of talk that could only transpire between one greatly troubled person and one greatly unbiased person.

And seeing as each of us is biased and therefore each of us has only _spoken_ with biased people, clearly none of us have a clue as to what Leon was feeling. But _clearly_ Cloud must have sparked some sort of faith in Leon for Leon to put into him and his pure and clean nature, his blank and carefree feelings.

"What do you think about, Leon? I know you haven't been reading because your eyeballs weren't really moving all horizontally and everything like you humans do when you read."

"I was just thinking. About things. Nothing in particular, I guess."

"Nothing you haven't thought about before?"

"No, nothing I haven't thought about before. If anything, something I've thought about _too_ much before."

"Is it something you're afraid of?"

"Not necessarily."

"Is it something you wish you'd done?"

"Not really."

"What is it?"

"I'm not sure. I know what it is, but at the same time it feels like I don't. Like I've been thinking about it so much that it's gone and lost whatever meaning it had to begin with."

"Is it something good or bad?"

"Is this twenty questions or what?"

"Is it something good or bad?" Cloud asked again, persistent, but in such a way that Leon couldn't even imagine being annoyed by it.

"I don't know. I guess it's just something that used to be unimportant, but the more I thought about it, the more it seemed important."

"It sounds sort of _strenuous_," the faerie said, stressing the last word and the most recently-added to his vocabulary. In fact, he'd only learned it that afternoon from watching the interaction of some random woman who walked into The Emporium. ("My, my, Mr. Leonhart, but what a _strenuous_ schedule you keep. Are _you_ sure you don't need something to... loosen you up? Maybe I could help you relax, you know..." "...I'm fine, Mrs. Trepe. That'll be three-fifty. Thank you, come again." "Oh I _will_. And I _hope_ you'll be here the next time I do, mm?")

Leon chuckled lightly at this, and had Cloud been the size of a normal person, he probably would've ruffled his hair or shown some sort of sign of affection. As it was, Leon didn't want to squash the little fellow, so he just stifled the impulse with a small sigh and continued on in an equally small voice.

"I'm sick of running, honestly... I'm sick of not doing the things I want so badly to do, just because of other people."

"Are other people really all that important?"

"...Shockingly enough, yeah, they are." Leon found himself giving Cloud a small smile, though it didn't quite reach his eyes and he knew it wouldn't get by without notice from the little faerie. "Even to a mean old asshole like me."

"I don't think you're a mean old asshole. ...Whatever you mean by _that_. Is it like being 'gay'?"

"Not really. But if it's easier for you to understand it that way, sure."

Cloud rocked back and forth gently, still perched lightly upon Leon's knee. If Leon knew how much hummingbirds weighed, he would've guessed that Cloud weighed about the same as one of them. And with the penny cradled in his arms, Leon could only wonder if some moments were just made to be picture perfect, or if luck simply brought them along as they came out of the bag, one by one.

He leaned back in his chair, and when he noticed Cloud watching him expectantly, waiting for and wanting him to continue, Leon did so, completely aware of the fact that he wouldn't even have thought of doing so for anyone other than Cloud.

"I'm wondering why I ever bothered trying. ...I'm wondering why I'm still _wanting_ to try, even now. I'm wondering when I'm finally going to hit a stopping point and be done with wanting to try."

It took several minutes for Cloud to come up with a response to this. During this time, he ran his tiny fingers along the rigged rim of the penny, going one way and then the other. He cocked his head to one side, then the other. He rested his chin on one hand... then the other.

And when he finally did speak, he did so without faltering and without slipping up in the slightest. And it was quite possibly the first time that Leon had ever felt completely and utterly _below_ any living being on the face of the earth.

"There isn't any such thing as a stopping point," Cloud said softly. "Nothing is ever going to stop. ...You say you're always running and you wonder when _you're_ going to stop. But the truth of the matter is that you're just never going to. It's you and it's this world- this _entire_ world and all of its **morals** and **ideals**- running against one another, that's all it is. And you're going to want to stop, but you never can. _There is no stopping point_. There's just the point when your body will become too old and too tired to continue on, when it'll lay down and fall to pieces. When the world will meet and pass you and leave you in its dust. But you'll still be running. You're always running. You'll just fall behind one day."

"...And what happens then?"

"Well... I'm not really sure."

"Cloud?" Leon asked quietly, not wanting to break the atmosphere with his deep voice and not wanting to somehow mess up the moment, that picture-perfect moment. "Do you want to know the one thing that sometimes makes me wonder if you're really real or not?"

"Yeah, I'd like to know that, I think."

"It's the way you talk. It's so normal, but so blunt and human, it can't possibly be real. No real person is ever really interested in another, no matter how close they are. People are selfish."

"I'm not a person."

"...That's right."

"But I _am_ real."

"...That's right too."

"...I'll stay with you until you fall behind, okay?"

"Why?"

"Because I want to know what happens. And maybe because I want to make sure you'll be okay."

x x x

Larxene was thinking.

It was a revolutionary feeling, really. Something strange and foreign creeping up on her, an idea, a concept, a...

"**_Kairi!_**"

Kairi jolted backwards from the sink and rammed her head into the medicine cabinet. Cursing, she stumbled to the left and rammed her hip into a cupboard. Cursing some more, she rushed to the right to avoid the cupboard, tripped, and fell towards a wall. Thankfully her arms reached out and caught her. But not-so-thankfully, one of her flailing feet ended up in the toilet bowl.

"Kaiiiiri!"

"Oww... Wha-at."

Larxene flung open the door a brilliant grin riddling her face as she exclaimed with all the brilliance in the world... "Oh, you're foot's in the toilet, dear."

"And you've got the IQ of a pea, but I'm not complaining, am I."

"Harsh."

"Shut up."

"Listen... I've got it."

"Got what?"

"I've figured it out!"

"What, what, figured what out?"

Slapping one hand against the little white pedestal sink, Larxene smirked and placed one hand on her hip jauntily, tossing her hair over her shoulder in what normally would've been considered a very striking pose, had Kairi not been pounding with bruises all over her body and had she not had one foot trapped in a toilet. Nonetheless, that didn't keep Larxene from explaining in a very matter-of-fact tone, "Yuffie... she couldn't see Cloud today. She's figured out what's wrong with her!"

"...Really?"

"Mmhm. So... we must be close. Have you been over to the Emporium lately? Maybe now that you guys are together, you're fixed too." Larxene rubbed one hand thoughtfully over her chin, over the five o' clock shadow that wasn't there and never would be.

Kairi simply blinked at her calmly, twisting her foot experimentally as she tried to free it from its little porcelain prison. "...But I haven't changed. Yuffie has, but not me."

"You sure about that?"

"Positive."

"When was the last time you saw Riku and Sora?"

"...Oh. I..." Kairi blinked again, her foot coming free and sending her staggering backwards slightly, though Larxene thankfully moved forward and stopped her from crashing into the wall. "I guess I haven't really been thinking about them lately, actually. I mean, with everything going on and... you know, Yuffie and all, I..." _Wait a... oops._ "I completely forgot to tell them about Yuffie!"

"Exactly!" Larxene sounded impressed with herself, to say the very least.

"What?" Meanwhile, Kairi sounded confused as hell, to say the very least.

"Kairi, look, look, look! You used to be so crushed because you couldn't live without them! This _entire_ time while we've all been scratching our heads like morons, you've been fixing your problem without even realizing it!"

"...You think so?"

"Well what else could be wrong with you? You're fucking _perfect_, for God's sake."

Kairi clearly had to think about this for a moment, rubbing her toilet-water-soaked ankle tenderly, her mouth puckered into a frown, eyebrows furrowed together as she tried to figure it out, slowly but surely. "...So... but... that would mean..." She turned to look up at Larxene, raising one eyebrow questioningly as she said, "You think the thing holding me back this whole time was... Riku and Sora?"

"Nononono, it's not that harsh, see. The problem was _you_. Yeah, I mean, you were _definitely_ the problem." Certainly the less-harsh version of Larxene's theory. ...If that was the case, Kairi was almost positive that she would never want to hear the harsh version. "No offense. But listen. Riku and Sora are a couple. And... and maybe you were too dependent on them!"

"I'm dependent?"

"Kairi! Listen! Go to The Emporium! I'm right, I know it!"

"I'm dependent on Riku and Sora?" she asked again, slower this time and enunciating each syllable as though she were trying to make sure Larxene understood her question. Maybe Larxene and her were having a misunderstanding. Maybe Larxene didn't really mean she was dependent. Maybe she meant something else entirely. Yes, that had to be it.

"Kairi." Larxene paused, making sure she had eye contact with the girl in question before continuing on the most serious tone that Larxene owned at the time, "You were living with them while they were banging in the room next to you. You went _years_ without sleep because you had to listen to your two best friends having sex and screaming at the top of their lungs all night."

"...You don't have to be so descriptive."

"I can't _believe_ I didn't see it before. Hell, I can't believe _you_ didn't see it before."

"So I'm really dependent on them..."

"Well come on. They were your best friends and they went like that." Larxene crossed her fingers as her smile stretched wider across her face, mocking, yes, but at the same time containing a sort of amused understanding that was all that Kairi guessed she could really expect of the older girl, especially as she said, "It only makes sense you'd be left hanging on. But now you've got us, so you don't have to cling to them anymore, right?"

"...Oh. I... never realized that." Kairi could literally feel something breaking inside her, yet she wasn't sure if this was a good thing or a bad thing. She seriously doubted that it was her heart snapping in two jagged pieces, but she wasn't sure what else it could be. And yet she was perfectly fine just leaving it there with a mental nod of finality, closing the book of the emotional roller coaster as she said, "...I guess you're right. I've got new friends now."

"...Uh, yeah, hey, whatever. No need to get all mooshy on me, got it?"

Kairi grinned wickedly and flung her arms out to both sides, completely sending herself hurtling towards Larxene and cooing, "Aww, come here and gimme a hug, Larxene!"

"Get _off_ me, you little leech!"

"Hehe!"

"You have a girlfriend now!"

"She's not my girlfriend. We're just trying to see where it goes from here."

"So then why'd she come asking me for kissing info this morning?"

"She did?"

"Yep."

"..."

"..."

"God, get _off_ me, Larxene! I _have_ a girlfriend! Where's your frickin' _dignity_?"

"...Crazy harpy woman."

x x x

Mr. Tigi was having a moment in which all his thoughts felt scrambled. There was the white of the room around him, yes, but then there were the things inside his head, blackened, shadowy, and very confusing. Images of a monster and its creator, the fear of being the creator of a monster.

But certainly, certainly not all creations were evil, were they? Even if a mortal was convicted of playing God. Things were considered evil because they were given life? Practices were considered sin because they defied tradition? It wasn't something Mr. Tigi could understand. It wasn't something he had ever understood.

A painting created by a poor man living on the streets could inspire someone so much that they found new meaning in life. They could put down the knife and vow to start anew, to force their way through their messy world and work it all out for the better. So... in that respect, a painting could give life, but not be viewed as playing God?

None of it made sense.

But as Mr. Tigi let out a small, shuddery sigh, something happened.

There was a dull pain, an intense pressure, the feeling of someone wrapping two cold hands around his skull and squeezing, squeezing, straight through bone until everything shattered. He could feel that something was wrong and he could see that something was wrong, watching his vision sway, jerk violently as his body collapsed to one side. He could feel that something was wrong as he began to lose feeling of his body, a strange, tingling sensation that began in the left side of his face, inside the skin, somewhere within, and spreading.

It spread along his face, seeping across to the right side. It spread down his neck in snakelike strands, slithering throughout and sinking into to his shoulders, his chest.

And in his last moments, Mr. Tigi's thoughts were happy ones. For he knew the answer and he knew that he was not guilty. And he knew that his children were as innocent as he and he was inspired by the painting, by the story, and by the feel of life itself that he should die.

x x x

"...Leon, you're here."

The room was darkened and for a moment, Leon had wondered if Cloud was ever there at all. He'd been wondering for the past two hours. He'd been wondering, thinking, all the while with his face between the pages of a book, the words lost somewhere in the space between them. And then...

"...I... w-what's going on...?"

"I'm sorry I couldn't help you. Why didn't you try? Why couldn't you just try?"

"Stop talking like that... What's..." Leon took a few steps into the room. Cloud was seated on the bedside table, his arms wrapped around his bent knees, his head resting above those. He looked... tired. "What's wrong with you?" Leon whispered.

"I'm dying, Leon. If I was ever really alive to begin with. ...I'm dying."

Are there ever words to say in response to that?

"...O-oh." He walked further into the room. He sat on the edge of the bed. And he refused to look at the small faerie seated just across from him. And all the while he felt as though he were being cheated out of the goodbye he deserved, wronged once more by the doings of his own hand. "I..."

"It's a scary feeling. To die and realize that you've never really been living much." Cloud looked up at Leon and though there was so much he felt as though he should say, as though he needed to say... nothing would come. All he could do was ask, "Why didn't you try, Leon?"

"Because I didn't want to! Because I'm fine with the way I am! I've been fine these last few weeks, okay? I didn't want to move because I was fine. I didn't want to try because... because..." Leon stopped himself. He scowled and he glared and he did everything he'd always done to push away and be pushed away in return. But none of it worked.

_I didn't want to wake up one morning and find there was no one I could talk to. I didn't want to close my eyes, only to open them and figure out that you were gone. Or worse, that you were still there. That I just couldn't..._

"What are you going to do, Leon? What are you going to do when you're old and lonely and..." Cloud winced, doubled over in pain, eyes closed to world and wanting to block it all out. Wanting to block it all out if it would make it go away. "Ah!"

x x x

_"He's had a stroke and..."_

_ "Well why aren't you doing anything?" Yuffie shouted into the receiver. From across the table, Kairi shot her a puzzled and alarmed look, but somehow she already knew._

_ Somehow, they both already knew._

_ "We're trying, Miss. We're trying, but he isn't responding. ...He isn't responding. ...And we don't know why."_

x x x

"Cloud..."

Never before had Leon experienced such an incredible feeling of helplessness. When he was ten and had accidentally set the kitchen on fire with Einstein's Kiddy Chem Set, he had felt helpless. When he was thirteen and had broken his mother's favorite vase while she was out and then had gathered and glued all the pieces back together just to find that one was still missing, he had felt helpless.

And when he felt he had failed as a teacher with in inability to communicate his excitement and get his thoughts and points across to his students, he had felt helpless.

But never before had Leon been forced to look death in the face as it gripped such a small, pure heart and clenched it between its two bony hands.

"Are... are... are you _fine_ with being miserable for the rest of your life? What are you going to _do_ when you see them all around you talking in a language you can't understand and feelings things you've never felt before? What are you going to do when you become just like _me_, Leon? When _no one_ can see you and _no one_ can understand you because... because you're so far behind... because..."

Cloud clenched his teeth together, eyes closed, one tiny, trembling hand clutching as his chest as he gritted out, "Because _I_ didn't try hard enough. ...What are you going to do when you're sad, Leon?"

"I'm not _going_ to be sad." Leon licked his lips and closed his eyes for several seconds, trying to figure out how he could compose himself, how he could pull all the thousands of parts of himself back together again.

And yet all he could come up with and all he could say was, "...Listen, I'm the type of person who's never been truly happy in my entire life. At least, I don't think so. And... If that's the case, having not been happy, there's no way I can be sad. I have nothing to compare sadness to. It's just a little bit below fine for me. That's okay. ...It... it wasn't your fault, Cloud."

"I could've tried harder."

"No... no, you couldn't have."

x x x

Somewhere, however few miles away, there was a room full of children who had never grown up. Whether it was because they didn't want to or whether it was because they simply couldn't, none of them knew. And they all sat quietly in the smallest of circles and they all watch numbly as their own lights began to fade away.

And though none of them knew what death was and though none of them knew how to fear it, all of them did. And all of them wished for their parent to guide them away like he should have, to take them in his hands once again and show them how things worked in this world they never understood.

x x x

"Hey... Leon?"

"...Yeah?"

"Can I try something?" Cloud asked quietly. When Leon only tilted his head to the side and regarded Cloud with a sad, puzzled expression, it was all Cloud could do to simply smile and say, "...I... I saw these humans on the street, you know. They looked happy. And they... They, um..." Cloud's voice trailed off, it died out.

He looked pitifully up at Leon, blue eyes glistening and burning and for the life of him, for what little life of him he had left, he could not understand what it was. He reached his arms up towards Leon and the human obeyed as humans always did. He carefully scooped Cloud up in his hands and brought him closer, towards his ear, hoping to hear what Cloud could not convey.

Cloud simply shook his head. He reached out, bent over and tired. His wings drooped around his small body because he couldn't feel them- they were gone to him, fading away piece by piece. He placed both of his small hands against Leon's cheek and cocked his head to the side curiously, completely thrown by it all. Still, after all this time, he was amazed by the wonders of the human race.

And then he leant forward and kissed Leon on the cheek, between his two outstretched palms. And for the very first time, Cloud began to cry.

"I'm not sure what love is... but I think I love you. Is that okay?"

"Yeah... it's okay, Cloud."

"...I'm glad."

"It's okay, Cloud... It's..." Leon bit his bottom lip because he wanted to feel some other sort of pain. Because he couldn't stand any pain that wasn't physical. Because he didn't want it anymore, because he'd never wanted it to begin with, and because it was all he had ever gotten his entire life. "It's okay... Oh God, it's okay... Please be okay..."

"...You know what I wish?" Cloud whispered. He forced a shaky smile as he looked up at Leon and he turned and buried his face into the warmth of the hand beneath him. _I feel so cold..._ "I wish I could die beautifully for you," Cloud murmured.

"Why?"

"...Humans like pretty things... don't they?"

"But..."

"I wish I was beautiful. I wish I was like you."

"Cloud, wait..."

"I'll miss you, you know?"

"Cloud..."

x x x

_"Seems like you've really grown attached to the little squirt there, __Leon__."_

_ "...Whatever."_

_ "You know it's true. So why is it? Cloud chilled with Naminé for a few weeks before any of us even knew about him. What is it that makes you guys so tight?"_

_ "...I talk to him. And he talks to me."_

_ "Is it really that great?"_

_ "...Yes."_

x x x

"Cloud, didn't you promise? Remember, you... you promised you'd stay with me. Don' you remember? You can't _break_ promises." Leon began to sound desperate, staring at Cloud with eyes that wanted to close and keep him from seeing something he didn't want to see. "You're not even _real_! How can you break promises?"

"I _am_ real, Leon." And Cloud sounded almost as desperate as Leon himself.

x x x

_"Well... whatever works for you, Leon."_

_ "Cloud seems to care more about what I think than any other person I've ever known. And he can't judge and he can't tell you what's right or wrong... but that's... I think it's a good thing. Because he's just Cloud. And he's just this simple, pure thing."_

_ "...And it feels like he's always on your side in the long run"_

_ "...How did you..?"_

_ Larxene smiled. "Lemme tell you something, Leon. There are some emotions that are painfully obvious and universally similar. And just a word for the wise? Love is usually the most obvious and similar of 'em all. But don't tell anyone I said that, got it?"_

_ "...Right..."_

x x x

An eerie light settled across the tiny form lying upon Leon's palm. He felt the beat of wings against his hand, one last trembling attempt at flight. One last try to unveil the only thing that Cloud had ever seen about himself as beautiful.

Leon watched numbly as it all simply began to break away. As Cloud began to... crumble. Just lying there in his palm with absolutely nothing that he could about it. Silver dust sprung out from the faerie and for half a moment, Leon stupidly wondered if it would let him fly. But happy thoughts were beyond him, even as he could have sworn he'd heard a laugh that sounded all too much like Cloud's bells and whistles voice.

And no matter what he could think of, Leon believed that nothing would bring Cloud back. No matter how much wood he knocked on, no matter how many times he clapped his hands, no matter how many times he shouted that he believed, he believed, he believed, dammit... none of it would save Cloud. Because by then, Cloud was gone. And all Leon held in his hands was air, and he felt as though he were no more than the King of Air and Darkness.

Perhaps he would have done White proud as he fell to the floor then and did not cry. For Leon didn't know how to cry, and although Cloud had been nothing more than a figment of someone's imagination, a pipe dream come to life, Leon saw then only one fact and one fact alone.

Cloud was more human than Leon ever could be.

And it _was_ beautiful. And Cloud would have been happy.

_And the gray gardens stretch from one horizon to the next, waiting for their dreamer's dreams to come to rest._

x x x

_Dear Larxene,_

_ By now I guess you've pretty much realized that I'm not here. And I'm sorry for leaving without notice, because that's certainly not something I normally do. But sometimes we all do things we don't normally do, I guess, or the world wouldn't be half as interesting as it is, now would it?_

_ I hope you're not thinking that anyone is to blame for me leaving (especially not you, because you're not). But I do have something I need to do, some things I need to get done._

_ If you look at the drawing, maybe you'll understand._

Folded up inside the envelope was a familiar charcoal-smudged picture that Larxene opened between her hands, a dusty blooming flower in a cold and lonely world- the only link between her and the starving artist in who-knows-where. And Larxene stared at her reflection on the paper and she did begin to see.

Larxene saw that her mouth was a stubborn frown, the corners of her lips buried into the smooth skin of her face, stitched in too tightly like the needlework of a desperate old grandmother holding onto the only thing she knows.

Larxene saw that her hair fell about her face and neck in short, wispy tendrils, brushing this way and that and certainly more beautiful on paper than it could ever have been in real life- _Right?_

She saw her eyebrows, knitting together in a soft but puzzled manner, situated over her eyelids, shadowed and smudged and erased and worked again and again.

Stray fingerprints danced around her face and outline, small, nimble scuffs of gray above paper that was once- perhaps- white.

And the thing Larxene saw last and the thing Larxene found odd that she did not see before was the fact that she could not see at all. The drawing could not stare back for the drawing had no eyes. There weren't even smudged lines, traces of thought or existence within those two spaces imprinted on her face. All there was whiteness.

It was as though the artist had followed her vision, lead along blindly by some passion to draw what she saw and what she felt and to somehow combine the two as they came through her arm, through her wrist, through her fingertips... all to make something beautiful. Yes, it was as though the artist herself had danced as fast as possible only to stop midway with no leading partner and no one left to turn to.

It was as though (and it was painfully obvious that) Naminé had no idea where to begin with Larxene's eyes.

Several minutes later, Larxene could be seen leaving the apartment complex. She would not be seen there again, though as she left for that final time, one thing for certain could be said.

Her face was completely different from that on the paper. Hers was a face of puzzled sadness, of not understand why she lost something and not understanding that it had been there to lose in the first place. It was quiet and lax, far from the loud and stubborn lines that had made it up before, the smudges even holding some conformity about them. She was reduced to shades of gray with no extremes, no white and no black to fall back on.

And yet somehow, something struck a chord within her and hit a color that hadn't existed before, or if it had, had been buried too far below to ever be seen. And it was then that Larxene truly changed, for better or for worse.

Of the five children who had so long been held back from their own adulthood, Larxene was the fourth to reach it. She was the fourth and she would be the final, with no others after her.

(x) (x) (x)

Epilogue to come, some strings to tie up, and then we're done, everyone. Reviews are appreciated annnd... That's that. (_That_ was absolute hell to write. My gosh. I've destroyed my evening.)


	10. Epilogue: Fly By Butterfly

A little warning in advance! The epilogue has virtually no dialogue. I only actually realized this after I was nearly done, so I apologize. It's weird, long, and completely too descriptive. But what the hey. It's done with, isn't it? Here goes.

(x) (x) (x)

**My Oh My**

'Epilogue: Fly By Butterfly'

For those of you interested in the matter, Mr. Tigi's funeral was a very small one. His immediate family was nowhere to speak of, really, all of them being either dead or simply misplaced somewhere on the vast face of the earth. Five individuals were clustered around the headstone, long after the words were said, long after the priest had left, wiping his brows with a kerchief and wondering what his wife was preparing for dinner that evening.

Kairi and Yuffie stood side by side, clasping hands. Yuffie was crying, but if you had asked her later why her eyes were red and puffy, she would have complained of seasonal allergies. Because Yuffie was a strong girl. And strong girls never cried.

Larxene stood alone, the bottom left corner of the grave a foot away from her toes. She fixed her gaze on that point where the grass gave way to a sharp drop of dirt and air. She kept her stare rooted to that one spot for the entire time they stood there and she stood like a statue, the angel that belonged in stone above the grave, instead living flesh and blood beside it.

Irvine held his battered old cowboy hat in his hands and he could feel his cell phone in his pocket. He missed his dottering old boss, he really did. But to make it up to the old coot, Irvine had promised himself he'd go back to college, just like Tigi had been prattling after him to do for some months anyway. Even though he was waiting for a call from the admissions office to see what strings he could pull, his phone remained off and away.

_Time to bow our heads and remember an old man that no one knew anything about._

Leon... walked away.

Ten minutes after the polished coffin was set in the earth and his friends had lowered their heads to grieve, Leon had just left. He could not shake the cold sense of betrayal clenching about him, the rock hard feel of the unforgiving world around.

Perhaps he cursed the sun for shining on such a day, the birds for chirping and the children for laughing. Perhaps he cursed the dead man for giving him a taste of someone- something worth everything, only to take it away before he really could hold it all in between his own two hands.

Regardless of the reasons for his anger and his coldness, Leon left. He was well aware of the fact that any emotion, logical or no, is an emotion nonetheless, just as real and just as powerful as the next. And for Leon, there was no escaping it.

x x x

So you've come this far. Are you proud?

You have seen the cast of perfectly normal characters take their falls and skin their knees. You've seen them at their best of times and you've seen them at their worst of times. But are you proud? Are you satisfied?

Perhaps if you are reading this, you want to know more. Perhaps you actually do care about Leon and his miserable end, or perhaps you just want to know what the purpose of it all was. Why four girls could do what one man couldn't and why everything fell to pieces in one fell stroke. Pardon me, my puns are sick ones.

Well if you will, if you so desire, you're welcome to witness life as it would be two years from the day when Leon walked away and tried to forget. Two years is not a long time, despite what many people may think. The older you get, the shorter the years grow, and for four out of the five, those two years flew by in the blink of an eye.

But what about the fifth?

What about Leon? Is he really all that important? Is he growing backwards and are the years growing longer as they draw by?

Well.

See for yourself.

The day is a cool one, an early spring day, a March day, a day when Traverse Town's children tie their sweaters around their waists as they leap from one side of the creek to another, praying they won't fall in. They aren't afraid of drowning, of spraining an ankle or bruising an arm. They just don't want their mothers harping at them about their muddy and torn jeans.

The children come and go in waves, really. As the grandparents, as the elders begin to thin away with age and time, as they are shipped off to their respectful homes and care centers, the younger move in- the newlyweds, the happy couples seeking a quiet little hidey hole to start a family in. They do, and their children grown, and the whole thing moves around in a big cycle.

Some years have their peaks, some years have their declines, their rock-bottoms.

Now if you were a bug- a butterfly, for instance- and you were to follow these children on this Saturday as they went about their carefree, messy little lives, you might find something a bit curious about Traverse Town. For one, it is beautiful. The trees surrounding the place are a fresh green, buds popping up left and right, new leaves unfurling and soaking up the sun, pouring out the air, waving in the breeze.

The dirt roads are soft and slightly dusty, a fine powder that clings to these children's sneakers as they run up the hill from the creek, playing tag, probably. But remember, you're a butterfly and you don't have the slightest clue what the hell tag is. You're just watching. Sort of. Sort of not really watching, because I highly doubt that butterflies are very intense observers of human life.

But maybe they are. I really don't know all that much about anything, and the ways of butterflies? That's no exception.

So now here you are, here you would be, following these children as they come to the concrete and the asphalt, little narrow strips going this way and that, one way, then the other. And you could, perhaps, follows them further as their games stop and they cross the street with leaps and bounds and they enter a shop on the other side, eagerly talking amongst themselves and chattering at a mile a minute.

And this is where you begin to go _"What the hell?"_

Because the building they are prancing into once held a very debatable shop with very debatable merchandise. And by now I am most certain you all are nodding your queer little butterfly heads and thinking _"Ah yes, The Emporium! Wait a moment- Oh no! The Emporium!"_

Yes, and no. The Emporium.

It is no longer a place for kinky role play, for costumes and condoms and strange little knick-knacks that really are no such things. That _do_ have a purpose, yet the purpose is possibly so vulgar and so farfetched that no one whose mind did not live in the gutter would ever think of such a thing. No, it's not a sex shop, not a toy shop in any way, shape, or form.

It is a candy store that Larxene stands in, behind the busy counter with another girl, black hair, brown eyes. Of course. Yuffie. And the two are squabbling over who was supposed to refill the jars of chocolate-covered gummy bears last and neither of them pay much attention to the children with their grubby fingers pressed against the glass, peering at the fudge, at the chocolates, at all the sweets their parents will hate them for eating.

In Larxene's defense, she will say that it's better for the children to have candy than condoms. Not because she supports the increasing teenage birth rate, but simply because without the contraceptives, no one's about to give it a whirl any time soon.

There are teenagers there, both of the heavy-metal variety and the bubble gum pop nature. They mingle and bicker over which is better- the watermelon shaped sugar covered chewy gadgets or the rows upon rows of sweet diet killing chocolates lined up one right after another.

And yet the sign still hangs in the window, "The Emporium." No frills, no decorations, and absolutely no nonsense.

"Larxene, I told you, okay? I'm in charge of the _chocolate_ crap this week!"

"Yeah, duh. They're _chocolate_-covered gummi bears, dipshit."

"Hey! Don't call me a dipshit, you bitch! There are little kids in this store!"

Following the death of Mr. Tigi and Irvine's return to the fine, fine hallowed halls of learning in some distant college or another (Though Yuffie had received letters. Most of them were written when Irvine was not quite sober. And although they were amusing, Yuffie couldn't help but wonder why Irvine only ever thought to write when he wasn't in much state to do any thinking at all...), Yuffie soon found herself with no job and no income.

That was when Axel had had a bit of a run-in with an old friend who told him that sex toys were out and candy was in. "You sell chocolate- syrupy things maybe. Still kinky and sweet enough to give market to those really deranged sex addicts you've got hanging around the closet, but you also reel in the younger generation, see?" Axel had given the appropriate eager nod and clever smirk in exchange for a golden ticket of advice and a small pink flower that he absolutely forbid Larxene to ever mention to anyone in her life.

That, my fine winged buggy little friend, is how The Emporium came to be _The Emporium_.

And yet as you flutter around the window stupidly, thinking the glass is invisible and wondering what strange force keeps you from following the little rugrats you'd chased up from the creek, perhaps your mind begins to wander and you find yourself thinking about Naminé. You thought she was gone, disappeared from the face of the earth, never to be seen again?

We know she passed the test, whatever it was. We know she disappeared. And yet as you flit about and wonder, wonder, wonder, you see a door swing open and a girl bustle out- short, with her blond hair pulled into a tie at the nape of her neck. The children flock to her and she carries a backpack slung over one shoulder, a sketchpad cradled under one arm.

Larxene shoots Naminé a look that is almost apologetic, but not quite, seeing as whenever Larxene deals with Yuffie, her nerves are still cut far too short to have the patience for apologies. And yet Naminé shrugs it off cheerfully, one lapse in their relationship that never made a difference as she succumbs to the desperate pleas for little favors that mean so much.

"Can you draw a picture of me? Please?"

"No, no! A puppy!"

"I want _Mothra_"

"Eww, not Mothra! Oh, oh! Godzilla! Draw _him!_"

"And a city for him to destroy!"

"Nooo, why not a pony!"

She draws the pictures because she can and because she has the passion to do so. Perhaps one day that passion and whatever it is that fuels it will be gone. Dried up from years of use and abuse- just absolutely gone. But for now it is there and there's a surplus of it all rushing through her veins and roosting in her brain, prodding and poking her to create, create, create.

On the top shelf of Larxene's closet is a large folder. The folder is not very dusty for she takes it down every once in a while and opens it to peer at its contents. Sometimes she sits the folder at one end of the table and sits herself at the other and she stares at it and wills herself not to open it. But she always does and she always wonders why she does.

And always, always she comes to the same conclusion.

She opens the folder to see herself both ways, to look upon the picture and look into her own eyes, now completed and bursting forth from the sheet of old paper with so much life that when Larxene first saw the drawing, she nearly screamed. Maybe it's true when they say that the eyes are the window to the human soul. Yet no one ever said that paper eyes were a mirror into something much deeper than the soul- something that even the greatest philosophers can't debate because it is just _that_ deep.

_"So his name is So-crates?"_

Naminé went back to school and there she learned how to capture those eyes. It was not something that they taught in school for it is not something that ever can be taught. It was a thing that Naminé taught herself through time, practice, and a world without real estate.

You can grow up and become something that will make you money but will not make you happy.

You can grow up and become something that will make you happy, but will not make you money.

And yet even if you have all the riches in the world, all the perfect clients at the perfect moments when real estate is _the_ market to be involved in... Even with all that, if what you do does not fulfill you, then you're simply not fulfilled. And that is so much worse than being unhappy.

So as you fly around in stupid circles outside The Emporium and watch with giddy delight as Naminé finishes her little obligations before setting out to her studio, you come to a conclusion. Naminé is doing something that she loves, therefore she is fulfilled. Larxene is doing something she seems to get a kick out of, therefore she is fulfilled.

No, two outta three ain't bad, but what about the third involved here as your loopy loops and twisty twists begin to dizzy you and the world behind the glass spins in and out.

Yuffie... right. Yuffie. Perhaps you follow her as she leaves some time later. You have been flocking from one flowerbed to the next and it has all brought you back to the same solitary building at dusk, Yuffie waving a careless goodbye to her co-worker as she strolls down the street, hands in her pockets and a thoughtful little look on her face.

And you being you, you follow her, for you're the freakish butterfly who flies like a drunken astronaut rigged up on too much oxygen.

She leads you down the twilit streets and into a small cul-de-sac ringed with small houses and small yards. The things are not small here because they have to be small, but they are small because they do not need to be large. No one is crammed together, but no one is ridiculously spread out. Everything is spaced as it can and must be and everyone within seems content to let it be as such.

Yuffie walks up the steps of one the small little houses, a strange yet adorable blue one with an absolutely extraordinary garden. And you being the creature you are, you admire the garden- the fresh buds popping up and the hopeful daffodils, the crocuses, the tulips, the magnolias.

And the door closes in your face and perhaps you kick yourself with one of your six legs for having been so easily distracted.

And once again you must watch from behind a barrier you cannot understand is there and you must draw your own conclusions and believe what you believe.

And once again... once again the things you see puzzle you. Kairi is there, yet somehow you knew she would be. She gives Yuffie a hug and waves her over towards the couch, pushing her into the seat and running off to another room, disappearing entirely. Yuffie is clearly confused and leans back into the couch. You are clearly just as confused and persist in whacking your tiny exoskeleton-covered-head against the glass in the window pane.

Kairi returns decked out in what you suppose is a new outfit she bought. You draw your own conclusions- she bought it that afternoon and spent an hour piecing it together to make it absolutely perfect, which it most certainly is. She worked so hard at it if for no other reason than to show it to Yuffie and to gain her adoration and appreciation because she wants to be appreciated and she wants to be adored.

And with Yuffie, she is.

You don't dwindle here any longer for you know that Kairi and Yuffie have their dinner to attend to and certainly there isn't anything interesting about that. There is nothing interesting about people's happiness, for if there was then there would be no morbid fascination with the idea of tragedy. And so that is what you set out to find- someone miserable and suffering who you can watch intently and marvel at their misfortune.

Now at last, you come to a darkened alley and you drift upwards in a lazy spiral, the sun all but gone from the sky by now and your little limbs growing very, very tired. The glass is there once more, but this time you know it's there as you set upon the windowsill and peer inside, curiosity still alive, of course, but dwindling.

Butterflies do not have a very long lifespan, or so I'm told.

It takes your eyes a moment to adjust as you sit there, looking in on the human zoo and waiting, watching for the one specimen you've been hoping to see appear. And he does- a burst of light coming forth as he enters from the hallway and stands silhouetted in the door frame. Whether the light behind him is holy or whether his darkness is demonic... neither particularly moves you to be certain of one thing or another.

Yet the door swings shut slowly and you see his shadow put a briefcase on the floor, loosen a tie around his neck. You watch as he moves further into the apartment and shake his head, shaggy brown hair flying forth and around. But it's all half-hearted as he collapses onto a battered, overstuffed chair. As he slumps forward and hangs his head in absolute defeat towards his own knowledge and ignorance.

He has papers to grade and he knows it. He's hungry, yet he doesn't know how to cook. He knows he doesn't want take-out and he knows that the empty space in his stomach is not the only empty space inside him. There's something that isn't full, some things that haven't been learned, experienced, and accepted for what they are.

There is still that belief that everything is going to be all right because good always triumphs over evil and this darkness around him is so evil that it can't stand _not_ to be triumphed over. ...Right?

And yet no matter how hard he tries, he cannot say his life is necessarily a bad one. He has had his relationships, the good and the bad. He has a stable job teaching something he adores, even if his students cannot feel that same love rushing through them like he does. Even if he cannot get them excited about it and even if he cannot get them to understand it the way he does.

There are, after all, things that he doesn't understand, too.

How the whole human race grows more complicated by the day and how it only baffles him more and more each morning in the moments before his feet touch the ground and they're just hanging there in midair, lost, confused, and with no foundation to stand on.

It is how Leon lives his life and he lives it just fine. Just as he promised he would.

And what happens next happens very slowly.

You feel something inside you begin to hurt and it swells and grows from somewhere deep within, pressing against you on all sides from the inside. It's pushing you out and making you grow in the most painful way and your head is screaming directions at your body to make it stop, make it stop. Your wings- they're still there- flap erratically and you find yourself slipping and falling backwards, off the windowsill, catching the night air and then tumbling through it, colors and darkness spinning around you as your tiny body plummets straight towards the ground.

And yet even as you fall, you think you catch a glimpse of something moving above you- below you? You can't tell. But you swear that in these last moments of your life, you see a boy hanging out the window and staring down at you with eyes brimming with so much hope that it's almost as though they're about to overflow, pouring down on your in sheets of sheer emotion.

You want so badly to have a voice and you want to scream _"Don't let me fall, you idiot! There is something inside me that is just like him and it's fighting to get out! Can't you tell? Can't you please tell?"_

But then it's over.

Your wings spread out in a last ditch effort your mind springs on your body and you catch an updraft that sends you rocketing back into space, up the way you came. Beneath you is Traverse Town, early evening spread out over it, light flickering in homes like little baby fireflies. Fireflies, you tell yourself. What silly bugs. And just for humor's sake we can say you have a cousin who's a firefly and he's simply the most outlandish asshole you've ever had the pleasure of meeting.

There are no stars in the sky yet as you float above the town, in some general direction, possibly, or just like another aimless drifter among a world that's just chock full of them. The draft soon leaves you and you find yourself descending once more, though it's a much slower process, a gentler thing as you come to land on something cool and solid, rough and dark beneath you.

You feel the thing inside you explode, but it's a silent explosion and it feels almost more relaxing than it does alarming. Strange, you think. But you begin to realize that it's not so strange after all. You're lying on a tombstone, clean and cared for. You can see a small fresh bouquet of four flowers in front of it, tied with a ribbon and left in dear remembrance.

For a moment you find yourself thinking that those flowers are there for you and that you were _meant_ to die here, one little bug that is just so much more important than the rest.

But you realize two more things before you finally leave.

You realize you're not the one buried beneath the stone inside the earth. You're just another flower sitting amongst the rest, the fifth, the final, and possibly the most beautiful and different of them all. And for that reason, you are happy.

And you realize that the conclusion to your life- the final thing you learned from flying from one flower to the next, watching one life and then another... you realize that the conclusion must be to draw your own conclusion. And for that reason, perhaps, you are sad.

But it does not matter, because happy or sad, that is the moment in which you slip silently out of the world and no one, save one silly little child, even knows you're gone.

(x) (end) (x)


End file.
